#no south park either... wah...

[toolshedstool]

oh lord, 2 free days left for me to wrap up whatever fics/art i wanna wrap up before i move and lose access to my PC for who fuckin knows how long. fics i can kinda take with me, but my drawing tablet i cannot. unfortunate :(

[kennymcchronicle]

3, 8, 12, 18, and 30!

hiii!!!!! :D i'll answer these for both of the siblings too because i'm having fun!!

3) Sports, love 'em? Hate 'em? Do they play?

Lotta knows keeping active is important to keeping yourself healthy, but PE classes are making it really hard to enjoy any of that. So apart from general fitness, she hates participating in most sports. An exception to this is boxing, which upon realizing how her anatomical knowledge perfectly ties in with taking down an opponent in this sport, becomes quite enjoyable for her!

Andy was probably on his school's soccer team, and hated every second of it lol. Hates sports that he has to take part in, but probably enjoys watching!

8) Has your OC taken a life? How does it effect them?

Please, Lotta is a professional! Her credibility as the unofficial school doctor would go down the drain if she ever unintentionally killed someone on the job! It's a different story when she can't save someone, though apart from Kenny - whose death she of course can't remember - that has not happened yet. Needless to say she gets pretty devastated in such cases.

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree; Andy only ever got close to killing people, be it bar fights or his horrible driving. He needs to be lucky in some aspects of his life after all, good on him!

12) Are they a team player? Do they do better by themselves? Are they at any way a leader?

Lotta can function on what's needed at the moment. While she isn't exactly a social butterfly, she can do well in a team provided her approach and ideas are heard out. She can get easily frustrated, however, if she thinks nobody is listening or their plan isn't going to work, and she would leave the group then. In her mind, at least, she functions best alone but will step up if the group needs her, so she can take on a few leader qualities as well, even if she would prefer not having such a position, depending on the situation.

Andy is not the guy you want on your team, lmao... Okay, I exaggerate. As I said before, Andy can absolutely work hard and bring forward ideas and build up projects with precision and care. The problem is just that he needs to be bothered, which is a state of mind that he gets at random. No way of knowing if or not he will ever start. According to him he works best at his own pace, and that rings true, it just means the rest of the group would have to move at a snails pace, and since he is not the group leader type either (too irresponsible), that just doesn't fly.

18) Would you and your OC be friends?

I feel like Lotta and I would be good acquaintances at most, she is more so focused on her work and her personal stuff, and same goes for me so neither of us would be too inclined to hang out! I'd say the same is true for Andy, though weirdly enough I could totally see him as a classmate friend, should he ever decide to pursue an apprenticeship lmao, he'd be cool to hang out with in class i think!

30) Say something nice about your OC, brag a little. Why do you love this character so much?

Man... I just love them!! Developing these two is such a blast, with every new idea! I like throwing them into situations!! I just feel like they're very interesting with whatever insane south park shit they're put up to!! And their dynamics with the canon characters is so fun to me, I love Lotta with all the ships I've talked about before, I love her as the Captain, and as the Mage, I love Andy being a bit of a loser and interacting with the parents and being chaotic as hell!! I just!! *gestures vaguely* all of this!!! It would only be half as fun without you guys though tbh, thank you all so much!!! literally!! wah!!! not enough words!!!

[popculturebuffet]

Star Vs the Forces of Evil Reviews: The Blood Moon Ball (1-15)

Welcome back.. though to most of you probably just joining me, welcome. I’ve been on a sorta hiatus from revewiing due to a combination of procrastination, depression, and being really busy. But I finally decided it was time to put boots to the ground and get back to doing what I love: Going on way too long about children’s television.  As such, with She Ra taking a bow a few weeks back and nailing it I got to thinking about another show that just so happened to end the year before: Star Vs the Forces of Evil. Part of it was very simple: She ra ended on a trriumphant note, making a well set up romance that had been it’s backbone canon, having a wonderful final battle, tons of payoff and a throughly happy ending that satisfied all involved and got tons of well earned coverage for having a deep, meaningful relationship between two lesbians finally coming together being the thing that saves the universe. It was freaking great.  Meanwhile a year prior Star Vs, after having been treated like toilet dinner by disney for no good reason by having it’s final season shoved out over a few sundays after a yearlong hiatus.. ended not with a bang, but with a wah wah trumpet. The series ending was unsatisfying, left more questions than answers, had the title character loose all likeablity and was in general miserable. I hadn’t been this pissed off at a finale since How I Met Your Mother and hadn’t seen a romance botched this badly in animation since “Merry Christmas Mordecai”. It was BADDDDD.  However it did make me want to go back to the series; To revisit the good, the bad and the just plain weird to remember what made me love the series, what made me want to throw my tv into a river before reminding myself “No dude, shit’s expensive. “, and what COULD have been, what SHOULD have been and what WASN’T. So i’ll be reviewing assorted episodes.. and the best place to start for me was with the introduction of one of the series best characters, as well as at the same time the start of a ship that was a good idea at first but would slowly take the series down with it as it started to fall apart. This is Blood Moon Ball. There will be blood, and a dead horse, after the cut. 

Before we get into the episode, one of the series most notable and honestly a damn good one, for those 2 of you not familiar with the series a quick refresher: Star VS is the story of Star Butterfly, a rebelious 14 year old princess from the Kingdom of Mewni. Mewni is your standard medievil fantasy kingdom.. but you know with wifi because they have magic compacts that work as phones and large sale acess to the multiverse. Their also ruled over by a long sucession of queens with great and terrible magic power, which is channeld through an increidbly powerful wand that’s passed down from generation to generation.  On her 14th birthday Star gets her turn with the wand.. and not long after sets everything on fire. Not wanting the kingdom to get blown up while Star figures out thing, her parents send her to Earth, and after bribing the school principal into enroling her, that’s not a joke on my part but an actual joke from the pilot, Star soon becomes an exchange student, boarding with the Diazes and soon becoming best friends with their teenage son Marco, a saftey obessed, shy talented martial artist. The two are frequently forced to beat up the hordes of Ludo, a spoiled monster king who wants the wand for himself. Things would get way darker... like in literally two seconds as the revelation star’s people stole mewni from the monsters and Star’s hatred being revealed to be partly racisim instead of standard hero and villian stuff. But that’s for future reviews. Today we have demons, internet commentors and ship tease to get to. So with the basic premise set up let’s finally get on with it.  We open on the arrival of my boy and yours, hopefully, Tom Lucitor. Tom is the prince of the underworld, basically exactly what it sounds like: fire, brimstone, demons spooky scary skeltons sending shivers up your spine. He’s also Star’s ex boyfriend. How they broke up is.. never really explained. While more details about their relationship, includign the fact Tom bought Star her iconic Devil Horn headband on their frist date, were revealed in the tie-in spellbook, and reveals that star’s arson that got her sent to mewni happened right after her and tom broke up, but never explains WHY.  My guess is since the series clearly frames the breakup as Tom’s fault in this episode and on his anger, they probably didn’t want a scene of him screaming his head off at star, either to keep him sympathetic or , more likely, because a scene of a teenage girl watching her boyfriend having a rage fueld breakdown that leads to htem breaking up would be MASSIVELY uncomfortable to watch and unlike some uncomfortable to watch scenes, wouldn’t tell us anything we didn’t know already. So unlike some later things they never pulled the trigger on this one at least makes sense.  Anywho, Tom arrives, parking in the handicap spot (a nice little gag as Star’s crush at the time Oskar points it out, while the dead skeletal horse pulling tom’s carriage turns around to look at him), and all the girls stop and stare.. including Janna, who would probably regret this moment once she realize tom was a bad boy because he’s socially awkard and has anger issues. Basically he’s Kylo Ren but his redemption dosen’t come straight out of JJ Abrhams ass.  Tom arrives at Star’s classroom, removes his shade and damn if he dosen’t have game.. but naturally showing up unnannaounced to her school (Not that TOm probably gets what school is as Mewni dosen’t have those, but still), basically assuming she’ll go out with him, after they had a messy breakup it dosen’t go well and we get a great cut of Star shoving tom back into his carriage.. we also get the best joke of the episode.  Star: So take your invitation and your fire and your dead horse and go.  Dead Horse: wait.. i’m dead? Sad but hilarious. Anyways it’s quickly conved to viewers like us that Tom has anger problems, but he insists to star he’s doing better: he has an anger managment counsler he takes with him places, Brian, voiced by the wonderful and weirdly in Disney’s pocket these days Stephen Root, and a bunny he pets. Before star can pet said bunny Marco , KARATE CHOPS TOM’S HAND OFF.. I just.. until this review I hadn’t sat back to consider just how freakishly strong that boy is , that he can just accidently chop off a hand. I mean tom may have weak joints or something but even after taking far worse blows later on his hands just.. don’t come off. Tom flies itnto a rage and it becomes clear that yeah, whatever happened, it was tom’s fault, and given the kind of rage she flies into, you can see why i’d assume the writers really didn’t want the audience to see him at his worst. I certainly don’t.  Star both worried and clearly having seen this sort of thing go bad before urges Marco to run but tom quickly recovers, both reuniting with his hand and having calmed down, and he and Marco are formally introduced, with star explaning the invite. We also get a great line with marco encouraging her “Star never go with a preadator to a second location”. This show was damn good at getting shit past the radar and i’m here for it. Anyways, Star isn’t quite sold despite tom clearly TRYING to get better, and Tom , in a really nice  move, gives her a bell and tiny hammer to summon his carriage with if she decides to go but leaves it up to her, not pressuring her or anything. For how selfish tom is initially.. this is a spark that shows h’es not a TERRIBLE person, just one who has some growing up to do. Marco however is not convinced and wants to go with, with Star teling him no because A) he wasn’t invited and it’d be rude to ask and B), she appricates the concerns but she can handle this, and implicily, despite her reckless nature knows this is a risk but knows if the night turns she can handle Tom, and that maybe he’s changed. Marco insists Tom can’t change.. which I find hilarious given his massive character arc to the point I had as eires ofessays planned, and one don about his growth before deciding to change formats to doing each ep of his journey instead every so often, to the point where two years on in the series timeline.. we’ve gone from Marco thinking Tom is a predator to...

But star decides to go and .. it’s clear from the subtext that while part of it is clear concern for star, Marco’s line about “it being fun here all the time” may mean that while he DOES have the best intentions.. part of him is jealousssssss. More on that in a bit.  For now we go to the underworld with the second best gag of the episode as Tom is toning down the spookiness to please star, and one of the guys in the picture at the top insults him... and when tom asks which one he says me. We sadly don’t get an answer but it’s small gags like this that made me want to do this episode by episode. Star arrives.. and things quickly go south. Tom tries giving her a corsage that’s a live spider and she rejects it. This admitely looks bad on both as Tom , living in you know, a hell dimenson probably sees it as a sweet gesture, and Star is refusing it.. but star does so POLITELY, and for understandable reasons, and Tom is still clearly pissed about it. Not long after, they line up for what’s essentially a prom photo.. and to get Carried by a bucket of unicorn blood, another nice little gag. Star refuses since well her best friend is a unicorn, one of them anyway, or at least it’s head.. and yes one of the species in this series multiverse is a bunch of headless unicorns. IT’s wonderful. And star also notices tom needs his anger managment bunny and is clearly pissed about it when, having dated her for several months, clearly should’ve KNOWN this might bother her.  That’s really tom’s problem here: He wants everything his way on his terms and only compromises if he thinks it’ll get star to do things with him. He’s made the PRETENSE of changing.. but he really dosen’t WANT to yet. He just wants her back and wants to change just enough to get her back so he can stop trying again. He also may , due to the underworld being diffrent and a place where being covered in a bucket of blood is a time honored tradition instead of the thing that turns a young mutant into a mass murderer, and yes I think a carrie x-men crossover would be the shit. He probably dosen’t GET that star wouldn’t like a spider corasge or bathing in her best friends blood.. but the problem isn’t that. that’s culture shock, that can be bridged with some talk.. the problem is tom dosen’t want to talk, he just wants her to do what he wants and things to be all cool and to get his way. Being a prince with two loving parents, we’ll meet them soon enough just not this episode, and tons of servants, I get the impressionf rom this and other episodes tom simply isn’t USED to not getting what he wants.He’s not USED to being told “No”, and thus has no way to deal with it healthily and isntead lashes out like an angry toddler. It dosen’t make his actions RIGHT but it does make them more understandable and makes it so Tom’s later growth FEELS natural depsite some of his sketchier actions beforehand. 

Back at Marco’s house, Marco is depressed eating nachos in a sumbrero.. which if I had corn chips, cheese and a sombrero would probably be my daily life right about now. It’s then we get a WEIRD dropped bit, as Marco hears a weird piratey voice telling him the blood moon is the moon for lovers and stuff. This is IMPLIED to be his monster arm, from an earlier episode.. but it’s.. never explained. Whatever it was going to be was dropped. Which would be fine if the blood moon itself and the end of this episode didn’t get a full explination in season 4 with the writers clearly going back to it to resolve the dangling thread.. but still not explaning the spooky voice. I mean what was it? Marco’s pirate ancestor? the sea captain from the simpsons? the monster arm? terry that bastard? Burt Macklin FBI? Old Man Withers the guy who runs the amusment park? Dirk Dastardely? A sentient payphone? The alps? Tell us damn you! Okay that tangent aside Marco decides to party crash at the advice of the ominous voice.. seriously is it Flintheart Glomgold? Nevermind. Back at the ball star is bonding with a small skeletal fish int he magma punch whent his random asshole comes up and whines for a good minute,if hilariously so, about the ball being changed.

He’s feels, looks and acts like the combination of those morons who were mad adora wasn’t “as hot” in the she ra reboot and was aged down to a teenager and the threw it on the ground guy.  After that interlude, tom shoos away a guy asking star to dance and the guy makes vauge comments about tom wanting his and star’s souls to be link while making kissy nosies. Before Tom can explain what he means by that, or at least lie about what he means by that, the blood moon is about the drop, the lights turn red and tom walks off because he wants the music to be perfect. And then Marco arrives in his really damn cool calevara outfit. Which fair play, I can see why, besides ship reasons, it gets a lot of art: it looks really damn neat.  Speaking of shipping.. it’s time. Star, not realizing it’s marco, dances with him.. quite romantically in fact. It’s here that the show conciously starts Shipping star and marco together. Starco is born, and the scnee is really good: romantic, well animated, jsut great all around. While the ship would .. end up done rather poorly and lead to some really terrible stuff at the time.. it wasn’t abd and already shipping them I loved this and even now, even knowing what woudl come later... it’s not a bad sequence. The only bad thing is what would come later, but I can’t fault the writers of THIS EP for what they would do in a LATER ONE. That’s just not fair. The ship wasn’t bad to start and the later arc springing from it in season 2 would be good.. it just quickly went in bad directions as the series went on , then disappeared, then how it finallyc ame about was just awful. But as much as I want to.. I can’t blame the sequence on this. It didn’t create rabid shippers or poor writing, it was just good and deserves to be praised as such.  Naturally tom takes this about as well as me when I found out HBO max wouldn’t be on roku at launch and prepares to murder Marco.. and promptly gets frozen by star who decides to wisely get out of there. It’s a ncie moment.. and  reminder that Star is crazy powerful, as is the wand itself, because as we’ll see later, tom is no slouch himself in the power department, but even if her attack was from behind, she still stopped him in one move.  So Star takes marco home and dresses him down for sneaking in, understandbly so: while it was an iffy situation, Star knew who she was dealing with and as shown at the end, was strong enough that tom was no threat to her, and given what we learn later, Tom’s parents would likely never let her come to real harm. For all her reckless decision making, Star thought this one out and Marco shoudl’ve repsectied that and didn’t for his own reasons. To his credit though he apologizes, Star admits to liking the dance, then the two speak in unison a few times, and we wont’ get followup on that till the last season! Roll credits. I don’t have the credits for this episode so enjoy this instead:

Final Thoughts: Blood Moon Ball is a spectacular ep. A good plot, a great introduction for tom, and great animation and humor really make the episode pop and it’s nice to get our first look at the underworld and tom himself. Tom would be back, and i’ll be back to tom eventually, but on it’s own the episode is really good and it’s standout sequence still holds up even as starco ended up in the sewer quality wise. All in all a great ep and a great starting point if you haven’t watched the show yet.  Coming Soon: A return to Star in the near future probably since Tom is great and his second ep deserves love too, as do several other star eps, as well as a look at the saluna episodes of the loud house because i’m in a gay mood for obvious reasons, and a loud house mood for less obvious reasons. Until then, feel free to hit me up with asks with suggestions or commisosns for future reviews, and until next time, later days. 

[kunderdogs]

Day6 / Christmas Morning W/ Kiddos

This was so cute. Thank you to the anon who requested it!! It’s June but who doesn’t like fluffy christmas reactions?! ENJOY!! Also, I mixed up the kids and numbers cause I feel like Dowoon the type to have only boys and Wonpil would be so adorable with a lil girl lol

Sungjin: The type to sneak down at 1am and eat like half of cookies that the kids left out for Santa. He’s definitely going to be excited, if it’s his child’s first christmas or 11th. You would’ve bought most (if not all) the presents so he’s just as surprised when they open it since he was busy with making music. Super stoked when the kids get awesome new toys like RC cars or helicopters. He’ll make sure to take pictures or videos of you and the kids opening the gifts and also he has to take a family photo of you all for his family album. Most of the day, he’ll play with your son and daughter, taking them down to the park and help your daughter set up her new cooking set. He’ll end up crashing at the park so the kids take this time to draw on his face with your daughters new art kit and he wakes up, oblivious to the pink whiskers on his cheeks or the bullseye on his forehead until they come home and you’re like “Wtf...You fell asleep didn’t you?” He shakes his head though with a shrug, “No I didn’t, but I-...those little weasels.” And now he has to get his revenge so he fills up the water balloons and catches them as they’re outside racing RC cars. They’re sneaky ones and end up cornering him behind the house and pelting him with water balloons the size of watermelons so now he’s screaming for you, “COME DEFEND YOUR HUSBAND!”

Jae: He’s the one that’s barges into the kid’s room at like five am with a cheetah print Santa hat shouting “It’s Christmas!!! WHY ARE YOU SLEEPING? THERE’S PRESENTS UNDER THE TREE!” Your kids aren’t even fully awake but Jae hoists them on his shoulders and runs to the living room. You’ll have to calm him down since he’s so excited to see their faces and all the cool things he’s bought them (which was months ago so even he has kinda forgotten wtf is there honestly.). Jae is the most hyped about whatever they got, pushing gifts in their hands faster than they can open them. You’re trying to take videos and pictures for both of your parents but Jae’s in the background facetiming Brian trying to show off the go kart as he drifts it around the house, “This is lit! Come thru!” But once he sees you glaring at him, he’ll laugh and join the kids to take pictures of their toys, putting your daughter on his shoulders and giving you a kiss on the cheek. Spends the entire day putting together the toys and playing with your kids. They spend most of the day having fun and Jae suggests everyone comes to dinner at the house. He ends up forgetting and has to order a bunch of pizza and take out but it’s a great time because it’s rare that all of the boys can spend family time with each other so they try to make the most of it.

YoungK: Still dead asleep when his son pounces on his back, demanding that he wake up and open presents ‘cause Santa was here! His son doesn’t detach from him until he’s sitting in front of the tree, with you smirking and holding your phone out to take pictures. He’ll finally wake up after the first gift was opened, but he’s just smiling widely like the proud papa that he is. Honestly, he has hidden a few presents from you and your son, so after most of them had been opened, he’ll go grab them and give them to you guys. It’ll be something adorable like your son has mickey ears and then you’re suspicious a lil and finally when you open yours TA DA! Plane tickets to Disney World! BOOM Y’ALL GOTTA GET PACKING CAUSE TOMORROW YOU FLY OUT! And then, it’ll turn into a tradition, every Christmas after your son turned like 6, he does some big surprise family get away - either it’s in South Korea or somewhere else. His gifts are always elaborate even if you tell him that he didn’t need to go that hard for a christmas gift. 

Wonpil: Faking sleep soooooo hard when your daughter bursts in your room, screaming that he’s gotta get up - right now! The smile gives away his consciousness, but she doesn’t notice and then shakes him awake. He’ll try to play it off but she’s too cute so eventually he gives up and bear hugs her and runs to the Christmas tree. She’s on his lap the entire time she’s opening her gifts. He’ll even “ooh” and “aww” certain ones, telling her which toy does what. He’ll clip in her new hair accessories but is definitely going to frown when he sees the plastic heels your sister bought her. “She’s too young for this!” it’s in good nature though so you don’t even pay him any attention, just continue to take videos for your memories. Will probably get teary eyed if she made him a present, even if it’s the worst portrait of himself he’s ever seen, it’s going right up on the fridge - no hesitation about that. He spends all day playing with her new tea set and helping her ride her new princess bike too. Later on, he’ll show you all the pictures and videos from today, even the ones he took of you when you weren’t looking.

Dowoon: Has a hard time sleeping on Christmas Eve because he’s so excited to show his sons what you two have got them! Honestly, Christmas shopping with Dowoon is like shopping for three boys. He wants to have fun too so he’s buying games and toys that they can play with together. He’s convinced you to get a ten foot water slide with a bunch of water toys so before the kids woke up, he’s already outside setting it up before running back in the house and pretending to be asleep so they can “wake him up”. He doesn’t last too long with that because his sons attack him and manage to pull him off the bed. You’re in the kitchen when you hear the ‘THUMP’ of Dowoon’s head smacking the floor and then laughter as the two sprint away. Eventually, they’re all gathered and finally rip into their presents, he’ll facetime his parents so they can see them opening the gifts but gets too distracted by all the cool toys and has to hang up. “Wah. I didn’t get a Playstation until I was way older! You guys are spoiled!” Definitely going to monopolize the gaming equipment they got and would only give them a turn when they dog-piled him and jumped on his stomach. You’ll have to step in and remind him of the surprise outside but he’ll be confused for a second before ushering the two outside. “Oh~ what is this? Santa really outdid himself!” “That says it’s from you, dad!” “Since when could you read so well….”

[genderrise3-blog]

MOSCO STREET, Chinatown

The other day when I posted my Mulberry Street page I touched on Mosco Street, which runs for a block between Mulberry and Mott, a block north of Worth. I have long been fascinated with it as I am with all of Manhattan’s short streets, which are often remnants of something much bigger; for example, in Manhattanville, the two remnants ascribed the title “Old Broadway” are remnants of the old, unstraightened Bloomingdale Road. 

Mosco was once Park Street and before that, in the mid-1800s, it was Cross Street; it cleaved through the heart of Five Points, once one of Manhattan’s worst corners; old Hell’s Kitchen or the Bowery has nothing on its street gangs, cold-water tenements, thieves’ dens. See the link, or read Luc Sante’s Low-Life or Tyler Anbinder’s Five Points to get the flavor of it. Much of its was razed to build courthouses and the new NYPD headquarters as well as Columbus Park, and most of it was eradicated by the mid-20th Century. But little Mosco Street is still there as a reminder. 

Consulting the 1885 map shown here, Park Street once ran a full 5 blocks, from Centre and Duane northeast to Mott Street, with only the easternmost block still there. A couple of streets are still there, though renamed; Chatham is East Broadway, while City Hall Street exists in a shortened form as Cardinal Hayes Place. New Chambers, the north end of William, and Roosevelt have been replaced by housing projects. NYC is a rapidly evolving entity, and the 2018 map will be unrecognizable by say, 2200, if Manhattan isn’t under water by then.

Mosco Street east from Mulberry

In 1982, the remaining stretch was named for community activist Frank Mosco, who was associated with the Church of the Transfiguration on Mott Street and involved himself with youth outreach, lower-income housing and the elderly, and organized the Two Bridges Little League. However, in Naming New York, Sanna Fierstein reports that Frank Mosco may have had a dark side. In 1976, he was arrested on suspicion of extorting money from an undercover police office posing as a street vendor. According to the NY Times, the amount asked for was a paltry $50, and Mosco was subsequently acquitted. 

#28 Mulberry, on the southeast corner, is currently the Wah Wing Sang Funeral Home, but the intricately carved eagle on the corner gives it away has having been something grander at one time. It is the former Banca Italiana, which opened in 1888; it gained the eagle in 1911, when Columbus Park opened across the street, as owner Antonio Cuneo considered it an important occasion deserving of the addition.

The northeast corner building is #30 Mulberry, where Frank Mosco lived. Mosco was aware that the city was going to name either the street or Columbus Park for him, and chose the street, considering it the humbler choice.

The Department of Transportation has always been inconsistent about street names and subnames. Were Park Street honoring Mosco in 2018, in all likelihood the street would have kept its Park Street signs and a Frank Mosco Street sign would have been added beneath it. Gil Tauber’s Old Streets site has a list of Honorary Streets where the DOT has done it like this. 

I just took a walk in Harlem. While 7th and 8th Avenues have been completely renamed for Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. and Frederick Douglass, respectively, the DOT slaps subname signs on 125th Street and Lenox Avenue, where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X have to settle for separate signs under the main signs.

However, a couple of years ago, in south Jamaica, the entire length of South Road was renamed Tuskegee Airmen Way, a group of African-American military pilots who fought in World War II, forming the 332nd Fighter Group and 477th Bombardment Group in the US Army Air Force (the Air Force was a division of the US Army during WWII). In 1981, Stone Avenue in East New York was completely renamed for a prominent neighborhood figure, (Rosetta) Mother Gaston, though the DOT initially missed a couple of signs. 

104 Mosco Street is the longtime home of the Bangkok Center Grocery, with an awning sign in the Thai language.

103 Mosco, apartment building with a florist on the ground floor.

Now the Greater Chinatown Community Association, 105 Mosco is bedecked with Catholic Church iconography. When built in 1924, it must have been an adjunct of the nearby Church of the Transfiguration.

The Church of the Transfiguration, Mott Street at Mosco, is the heart of Catholic Chinatown. 

It is the oldest Catholic Church building in the city, but not the oldest Catholic parish church. It was built in 1801 as the Zion English Lutheran Church and became a Catholic church in the 1850s; St. Peter’s, at Church and Barclay Streets, is the longest-standing Catholic church that’s always been Catholic.

ForgottenFan Dominick Fallucci: From my childhood (early 1960’s) until about the late 1980’s, Park Street ran from Mott Street to the intersection of Baxter and Worth Streets. My mother grew up at 95 Park Street, which was torn down along with the other tenaments on that block about 1961. I believe they were going to build another “urban renewal” project which didn’t pan out. For years until Columbus Park was extended to demap Park Street, that side of the street was a parking lot.

Mosco Street from Mott, looking west toward the Thurgood Marshall Courthouse and beyond it, One World Trade Center. This is enough of a downhill to attract sledders in the winter, and the local kids called it Suicide Hill.

Mosco is illuminated by just one Bishop Crook but some NYC Parks-style type B’s surround the church.

Please help contribute to a new Forgotten NY website

Check out the ForgottenBook, take a look at the gift shop, and as always, “comment…as you see fit.”

12/19/18

Source: http://forgotten-ny.com/2018/12/mosco-street-chinatown/

[elmerinolatino-blog]

Level 2: Mexico City,D.F., CDMX.

After a kickstart of my trip in the USA, it was time to start off my actual purpose of travelling: Latin America. First stop: Mexico City (/Ciudad de Mexico/CDMX, or also called Distrito Federal/D.F.). So many letters.

As my plane starts landing I see a city beneath me, which reaches until the horizon, and does not stop. And I am watching from the side of the plane where, actually, the smallest part of the city is - the east. The largest part of the city is to the west, south and north of the plane. It looks like a layer of brown hangs above the city. For those of you who don´t know, I just finished my masterthesis about air pollution, and now get hyper aware about being in polluted environments. Off to a good start...

The airport is huge and I get lost because signs send me the wrong way. No problemo, I think. I´ll just ask the way and earn my first points for asking the way in spanish. But WOW, these accents! I am used to hearing spanish people speak spanish, but mexicans… not so much. One point for me because I managed to find the exit, eventually. 

The magic of the Mexicity metro

The metro in Mexico City is insanely cheap, with 0.25 eurocents for a single ride. However, with tens of millions of people in one city, in peak times, this means that the metro is… full. And not full like Berlin in rush hour, but really, completely full with no possibility of movement. I feel ambushed. I need to get into the metro, however, so I just push myself and my backpacks in and feel extremely antisocial. Two metro stations later everyone gets out, and I see a sign with “Correspondencia” (which, with my limited spanish, sounds like a legit metro station name). This is not my stop, I think, so I just stay and we go back to the airport. At that moment I realise that this was the interchange (correspondencia) station. It´s just that the metro station name signs are in exactly the same font, the same size, so my western, hyper-organised brain did not make that connection. I notice my error and get out the next station, the next train comes, is even fuller than the last full metro, and then get the second train (also completely full,but I need to get to town…). Eventually, I get to my destination in 2.5hours, where I calculated 2 hours. And the airport is basically in the city. These are the kind of travelling times you take for moving in this godforsaken monster of a city.

Marvels

The first two days I am amazed by the most beautiful parts of the city: art-deco neighbourhood La Condesa and artyfarty Frida Kahlo-hood Coyoacan. Here, I visit my dear artista-from-another-mistah, the lovely Aurora. Together, we walk through the squares and alleys of her neighbourhood, marvel about the beauty of the squares and start theorising about urban spaces (Aurora is the best buddy for this). We soak in the colours on the street, and we have cake (because cake is the elixir of life). In the evening, we have a sandwich, and BOOM - stomach starts feeling weeeeeird. 

Sickness and suffering, and a story about birds. 

On my way to my hostel i start feeling sick. I get my hostel and make a run for the toilet, and then another one 10 minutes later… and then another one... repeat repeat. The hostel checked me into a room with only walls, so there was a ventilation system to keep circulating air into the room. BUT. Mexico City gets cold at night.. like, it approaches 0 degrees Celsius. So there I am, sick, with a tiny blanket, and a good dose of AC to make it worse. These were two miserable days in bed... and then, luckily, I started to feel better. Warm welcome to Mexico too :). 

The next few days, I decided, I will just take it slow. Mexico City, however, does not make it easy to take it slow and to start being active in a relaxed way. There is no relaxed in MexiCity. The city is full, loud, quite dirty (where are the trashcans?).. so in a bad bad state of mind, I wrote the following text: 

Imagine that Chicago and Berlin (my last two cities before MexiCity) are two cute little birds. You feed them some crumbles of bread in a park on a warm sunny day. There's a cooling breeze. Everything seems to sparkle, you take a deep breath and release the air in your lungs slowly. The birds sing a little lovesong for you to thank you for the bread, while looking you in the eyes intensely with a look full of love and compassion. 

 Then there's Mexico City, a tucan with rabies, which flies around you wildly and screams at you constantly, pecks at your head, vomits over your head for fun, and deposits its poo on your head too. But this is not a normal tucan. This tucan has evolved and learned the fine art of waterboarding, while electrocuting you, freezing your nipples (for the yolo) and when you try to take a breath from waterboarding, it farts in your mouth. Imagine that all of this happens in a freezing Aztec Temple's torture chamber, with Mexican folklore music at volume max. However, when a ray of light falls into the chamber of the temple, the intense colours of the tucan's feathers reveal its beauty. You appreciate it, but when see a chance, you run. And that's exactly what I did. After a week, I ran. 

I honestly could not stand the city anymore. I hardly made it out of my neighbourhood because it was badly connected to the neighbourhoods around it (45 min walk or 30 min walk + 15 min metro), the bike system didn't work for me either... And I made the mistake of assuming that it would be fine to buy all my needs for my travels in Mexico City. This meant me walking around and looking for hours for where to buy stuff, asking people, getting wrong directions, asking more people, and getting frustrated. And those comparisons with the tucan? Most of those have an element of truth in it. During the day, I got sunburned. At night, it was almost freezing. About electrocution.. there are low hanging power cables everywhere, so you have to look up. But, you also have to look down because the pavements are broken (earthquake?). There is an extreme amount of noise (music on full volume, people with ghettoblasters and microphone to sell or buy stuff, cars honking). And then there's the air pollution... which is not as bad as I've seen in China, but it is still bad. And yet, I feel like I've only seen a small part of a grand city with some very beautiful feathers. I need to see more of this city, which I definitely did not appreciate enough. In two weeks (end of Jan), I'm going back. 

Next! The smaller city of Oaxaca (pronounce wah hah kah), a place where I learned to love Mexico... and had a little love story. That's all folks! Some photos will be up in a few days.

[shaquanm]

Paper 1:

The part in the white devil that I am finding most interesting was the fact that the economy was declining, and people were dying of illnesses. Killers were murdering people without consequences, yet higher authority wanted to commemorate the landing of Columbus in America. This puzzled me because Columbus is being celebrated for leading a civilization in America, in which is full of crime, violence and poverty. At this time, the English, who have settled and capitalized in America is nothing more than blood sucking vampires, feeding on the land and the people (including their own). The exhibits that catch my attention are The Eskimo Village,  Penobscot Indians, The Chinese Theater, The South Sea Islanders, Java’s Quaint, The Aztecs. I would love to add the Slave Trade, and when it was abolished. The connection that I can make between other books and topics is that: where there is physical power, there is greed and darkness, and where there is poverty and suffering, there is creativity and strength.

THE ESKIMO VILLAGE - In the fall of 1892, there arrived at Chicago a colony of Esquimaux, taken from a point as far south in Labrador as Esquimaux could be found, and labeled as denizens of a land as far north as could be reached. But southerners as they might be, in Labrador, it was feared they would do ill in Chicago, where great heats prevail in July; hence a whole winter was allowed to them for acclimatization. In order to give them a supposed advantage, the colonists were admitted to Jackson Park proper, where they were allowed to build a stockage and charge an admission fee. No sooner did summer appear than dissensions arose; the fur coats were thrown aside, whereas the public desired to see the customary habiliments of the North, and at last ten of the twelve tribes set up a kingdom elsewhere, claiming that they had been deceived by the contractor who had taken them from home. Our picture shows the nearly deserted settlement as it appeared after the revolt, and the northmen at the game they constantly played with "black snake" whips. One of the semi-spherical huts may be seen at the left of the native on our left, and the meager attendance of visitors is representative of the small patronage that rewarded their exhibition. Had the Esquimaux settled on Midway Plaisance and held together, their remarkable ethnological character would have received earnest public attention. 

PENOBSCOT INDIANS - The engraving represents the exhibit of four familes of Penobscot Indians, living in their birch-bark wigwams, near the Ethnological Building, under the care of Mr. H. E. Hunt, Indian agent at Oldtown, Maine. These Indians had birch-bark canoes which they paddled in the waters of the Exposition, particularly on the South Pond, near by. The birch-bark hut, on the left, was one of several belonging to the living representatives of the Iroquois who lived in Jackson Park all summer as part of New York State's exhibit. They also had bark canoes and dug-outs on the South Pond. The presence of these red men, with many others, gave to the directors of amusements an opportunity to secure impersonations of aborigines on the floats at night, and red men multiplied prodigiously after dark on festive occasions. The good behavior of these first families of North America during their residence in Chicago was the subject of universal remark, and it was learned by the whites that they have not yet secured the self-control and sense of equity which the Indians displayed on all great days. The ticket-takers averred that the Indians were best fitted to be in an assemblage like that of Chicago day, when seven hundred and fifty-one thousand people were present. To classify the American Indians, and understand them ethnologically seems a hopeless task to the layman, but those who may be interested in the Penobscots will find an article by L. Sabine, in the Christian Examiner, volume 62, pages 27 and 210. An article entitled "Ancient Penobscot, or Panawanskek," is in the Historical Magazine, volume 21, page 85.

THE CHINESE THEATRE - Although a considerable distance from the western gate, this structure was the most noticeable object on the north side of Midway Plaisance, going in. Its color was blue, its trimmings were reddish, and its architecture was too open and too evidently ornamental to please the Western taste. The Wah Mee Exposition Company was organized by a Chinaman named Sling, who came from Ogden, Utah. The fact that Chicago carpenters built this temple may account for the somewhat angular appearance of the principal towers, and the early bankruptcy of the Wah Mee Company suggested either the prejudice of Americans against the Chinese, or their lack of the qualities of entertainment. As the Receiver continued in business, it is probable that the patronage of the last months of the Fair was more satisfactory. A large troupe of actors played a drama called "A God in Heaven," with Joss and other idols on the stage. Men impersonated female parts, as in the early days of our own drama. A perfectly hideous noise made on a great brazen gong rendered the stay of a Caucasian terrible in these precincts, and probably ruined the commercial prospects of the enterprise. In the bazaar, entrance to which was free, a very wise Chinaman, with huge and mirth-provoking spectacles, told fortunes to an admiring circle of men, women and children. The wise man had an interpreter, who read and explained the prophetic writings.

THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDERS - Opposite the Javanese Settlement, at Madison avenue, on Midway Plaisance, was the rude theatre and village of the Samoan and Wallis Islanders, and these were the best physical specimens of manhood offered by the World's Fair. The engraving shows five of the men seated for a song. Their Kava-house is in the background. The Samoans were the most industrious entertainers on the Plaisance. On a high platform overlooking the street were two hollow logs. Two men usually belabored these logs in the name of music, and as there was much rhythm and some variation of sound, this music, like that of the Turks, would soon take possession of the mind. Forming in single procession, the villagers would march out of their front gate and by semi-circle into their theatre, enticing a dozen, a score, or a hundred of followers at a fee of twenty-five cents. This march would be repeated while the audience waited, and when a sufficient "house" was obtained the four dances and songs which comprised the programme would be given with ardor and realistic effect. The engraving shows their costume. Their skins were of a bright yellow, well oiled. They were not Kanaks, and were superior in all ways to that great but unhappy tribe of men. There were four women and a little girl, who were dressed in the latest American fashion. The dances were quite remarkable, showing unity, skill, and ingenuity. 

  JAVA'S QUAINT EXHIBIT - The exhibit which is portrayed in the engraving was placed in the east gallery of the Agricultural Building, and it was by covering a window and creating this artistic typanum that the picturesque effect was produced. While it might be thought that this was an out-of-the-way nook, and that few would care to note the quaint and modest display of the humble Javanese, still enough millions came that way to entirely destroy the matting, which, as may be seen in the picture, was beginning to give away when this scene was perpetuated by the camera. On the central show case was the model of a Javanese bridge, made after the fashion of Javanese engineering without nails, screws or mortises, but by merely lashing the timbers together. Here the principles of the truss and arch are demonstrated. The Japanese operate in a similar way. The show case contained bunches of grass and tea, for the Javanese, like the people of Ceylon, while famous as coffee makers, are most desirous to secure some of the tea trade which China and Japan enjoy. The glass jars contained samples of tea or coffee in the leaf or berry. The scene in the center of the tympanum is an English painting of a Javanese landscape, while the low estate of native art may be noted in the rude carvings and paintings which are seen at the sides. THE AZTECS - Between the Scenic Theatre and the Illinois Central Railroad viaduct, on the north side of Midway Plaisance, during the last sixty days of the Fair, a band of Mexican Indians was settled behind the structure which is here portrayed, and for the sum of ten cents the visitor might enter. The sign reads: "The Aztec's Village. Alive and on exhibition here. Original home-life and industries. Weavers and metal workers; sports, pastimes and ceremonies; singing and dancing." The people in the photograph are going westward, and the entertainment is not open. It was never a successful enterprise, following, in this respect, the history of other far Southwestern exhibitors that have come to Chicago. Lieutenant Schwatka's Cliff-Dwellers, the original Moquis, utterly failed to arouse either scientific or lay attention, when shown in the Owings Building, several years ago, and the poor creatures endured extraordinary privations before they reached their own country again. There was some doubt, too, in the public mind as to the genuineness of the Midway Aztecs. Their serapes were said to have been made in Germany. Their booths were filled with trinkets, however, and if general knowledge of Mexican aborigines had been greater, a good trade might have gone on, for the Midway was crowded. There are so many different tribes of Indians in Mexico that only such scholars as Prof. Powell can even name them.