Big City/Little Man - Urban Housing
In my first week in New York, I managed to offend several women by calling them “mam” and even mystified a homeless man by actually making eye contact. But my first week wasn’t all fun, I assure you, as my living situations were tight.
A friend was kind enough to let me stay in his one-room, 9′ by 6′ apartment. Essentially a glorified closet-space, life wasn’t easy. The loft bed was mine though, and the friend kindly took the couch underneath. This left the entire twin bunk-bed open for my belongings. My two duffle-bags lined my right hand side, and my books and a care package from home lined the left. This left approximately 5 inches on either side of my body open for stretching, rolling and pilates. Swaddled in my belongings, I slept surprisingly well. I was also comforted by the fact I would find an apartment of my own, or glorified closet of my own, soon enough.
That’s when things got interesting.
The market for housing in New York City is tight. It’s so tight that people commute hours every morning and night to avoid paying for a floor and roof on the island itself. This extreme situation gives landlords a power unmatched since the days of Rome - able to give you a thumbs up or down, deciding your fate in an instant.
The first question from every potential landlord was the same - do you have a steady job? The actual truth differed from my answer slightly. I assured them that I was working “very, very steady” and may have fudged up by often slipping “maybe even a little too steady, if you know what I mean.” The said landlord was not amused, and apparently he did not know what I meant. The sad truth - I was actually not remotely employed. The possibility of moonlighting as a sex worker stood as my only true option, and that same line of thought may have been my only hope at convincing a potential landlord.
We looked for weeks. I seriously considered - at one brief point of despair - renting a post office box as an apartment - but unfortunately they required references. We looked everywhere. Uptown. Downtown. Chinatown. Crazy Town. And those guys were no help at all.
Things looked really good at one particular apartment. In Williamsburg - directly under an aboveground train track - this area wasn’t in the best part of Brooklyn, but it had it’s charm. For instance, I thought it was just charming the way people were just sleeping all over the street. Lord knows I’ve had lazy days, but these guys really took it to a new level. Also, if we moved in, we’d likely be the richest in the neighborhood. Without a job, that’s an impressive jump in social status.
Unfortunately, things didn’t pan out. The landlord, who was a hassidic jew that for some reason smelled of seafood, was really looking for more than we could offer. I thanked for his time, and told get out of his hair.
Nearly a month passed before we found a really decent prospect. We scheduled a visit with all the potential roommates and the landlord. Oddly, we were asked to meet in at ten at night in front of the place.
The apartment was simple, but fairly spacious. The only real quirk with the place was the landlord himself. Harry’s an Albanian immigrant whose main focus in life seemed to be the promotion of very pro-Albanian, Pro-Christian, Anti-Gay, Anti-ProgressiveRationalThought agenda. From the South, my roommates and I made the mistake of being courteous and faking our interest. We failed to factor in the years of deaf ears that Harry had put up with. Harry unleashed upon us a windstorm racial slurs, obscure religious beliefs and bad math. I’ve included some of his pure-gold sayings below for your benefit, in order of downright amazingness.
-You seen them posters for the… err… the One Nation Under Dog (referring to movie poster to the children’s film “Underdog”). Seems like God would be the last person they’d want to offend. You know? Hmm.
-You know how blacks and Asians don’t have hair on there arms and legs, it’s because they aren’t fully developed. Hair on your chest and arms means… err… that your proto-Albanian. That’s the… err… perfect form of male.
Harry’s words struck on several levels. Not only was he telling his entire belief system to complete strangers, his degree of passion was only rivaled by his degree of utter insanity.
So my roommates did the natural thing - we immediately signed a lease to the apartment. Sure we discussed the pros and cons at length (about 14 minutes), but one fact stood apparent. Only a man as unstable as Harry would accept three jobless twenty-somethings as tenants. I just hope he never realizes how truly hairless our chests are.
Filed by Zach at September 6th, 2007 under Articles.