Hacker News Reader

I work remotely and live in NYC. Honestly, I cannot imagine living anywhere else. Present conditions notwithstanding, I believe New York to be an ideal place to base oneself. The connivence to both everyday needs, world-class food, culture, and yes, employers, is unparalleled. And on top of that, there is perhaps no better place in the US from which to explore the world.

People say it's expensive but they act as if you get nothing in return for what you pay, which is certainly not the case.

Can someone please explain what people mean by "culture"? I'm a working class joe, I can't afford to pay for Broadway tickets regularly. What's the benefit here?

I am not sure what the OP specifically meant, but here goes:

when I talk about "culture" in my city, I am usually referring to how often I will end up at events which broaden my perspectives, simply by tagging along or following the suggestions of friends/acquaintances. For example: wine tastings, art gallery/museum openings, open mic amateur stand up comedy events, [specific thing, e.g. cactus] festivals, and so on. (in my experience many such events are free/inexpensive)

What city has cactus festivals?

We've lived in NYC both at a time when we had very little money for culture and also now when we have plenty of disposable income. So there is a free/low-cost culture here too, although, generally we now don't hesitate to pay for the more expensive things.

When I said culture I was thinking to myself a lot about diversity. This is a major outpost for movie production, tv production, theater, music, dance, comedy, art, writing. And so we end up with both the high end version of those, i.e. broadway, and also all the supporting versions as people climb the ladder to the big leagues or even just need smaller place to test an idea.

It's so intwined with the city that I run into it everywhere. An element of that diversity is that I experience a lot of surprise. I'll see something or meet someone and learn something that I didn't already learn.

A smattering of experiences:

- My partner has a season pass to an off broadway theater and had Hamilton tickets before it was on Broadway.

- Twice now I've lived directly above major magazine editors. One was the #2 at Real Simple and now is on Medium's internal team and my current downstairs neighbor is at the Atlantic. How do they think about current events and how to best explain it?

- Janene Garafolo is trying to start a comedy club in Brooklyn and it's a very relaxed and easy night out that's only a few blocks from my house.

- I ended up friends with a guy now on the air at WNYC right when he was making the transition into radio. He'd take me to Moth Story Telling Competitions and sometimes he'd win which led to him getting much more serious about audio storytelling. But when I first met him he was dirt poor and sharing a very shitty car with my now girlfriend.

- I ended up at a lot of parties with one of the lead dancers at the Paul Taylor company. She's probably one of the top ten dancers in the world. And this was just a run of the mill house party, maybe ten people sitting around drinking.

- The artist who did Obama's presidential portrait is on the permanent collection at Brooklynn Art Museum and his urban men restyled as Renaissance paintings kind of blew my mind.

- Almost everyone here is up on a current museum exhibition, theater thing, or writing. So culture is just part of the conversation here.

- I was sitting at an off-broadway play and ended up making small talk with the person sitting next to me, Deborah Eisenberg. I had no idea who she was, but she had just had a book reviewed by the NYT. She looked bored because her partner is a famous actor (recognizable by anyone who saw Princess Bride). And so he was fending off a fan and she looked bored. Later I saw her speak at a non-fiction center near our place in Brooklyn and the audience was almost all writers.

- The TV show Dirtbag on Amazon seems pretty well known. (It's also great). I saw her do a one-woman show version of season one. It was about 90 minutes with just her performing. Tina Fey was sitting right in front of us, which is part of the pipeline thing here. Performers are out checking out other performers.

And then on top of that, yeah, I go to the movies and see mainstream movies and what not. Or I used to in the "before times."

Sure everyone will talk about art and food and all of that but culture in my mind comes from something deeper. I live in Brooklyn where I can walk outside and meet people from every corner of the world without leaving my block. The philosophical perspectives that people come from hits you with every interaction you have. The longer you live around it the more you learn about their back stories and why these different groups of people carry themselves differently than you might or dress differently, work differently, eat differently, make love differently and so on. Often times these interactions are small but still impacting, other times they are intense and moving like hearing first hand explanations what it was like to live through atrocities from around the world and what it takes to escape but they all hold meaning and a life lived only surrounded by large groups of the same often leads to everyone eating the same things, enjoying the same art and music and missing out on, or even understanding the things outside of your own bubble. Sure you don't need to fit the mold of the place you live but in a place overflowing with influences it is clear that there is always more to soak. So as a working class joe I can still find myself experiencing things that I would have never sought out myself simply by walking out my front door and having a conversation with a neighbor.

I've also been working remotely from NYC - lived here for about 7 years now. Agree with everything you've said. The people and the level of ambition and energy here is unrivaled anywhere else I've been, save for maybe Tokyo or Hong Kong. I'm also optimistic that things will return to some semblance of normal within a year or two. I'm also hopeful that the coming months will provide a bit of a reset with lower prices that will allow residents or businesses that were previously priced out to return.

I loved NYC in many ways. But it's unforgiving. If you make a single mistake, or if anything bad happens to you, you'll be crushed. Lucky enough if you even have the dough to hire a U-Haul to hump your stuff back to the real world.

NYC is great. But keep everything you care about in three suitcases, and be ready to haul ass at a moment's notice. And for heaven's sake, don't sign a lease, much less a mortgage.

> I run a company, but I've found a way to do that with very few meetings and very little email. Most weeks I just have one meeting and many days I don't send a single email.

I'm very curious to know what your secret is!

Agreed. I absolutely love it here. There's still the huge downside of the cost of living. And competition for good school is starting to take a toll. But everything about the people and the energy is like no place else.