New York City

I've had reason to be in New York City the last two days and I've had a wonderful time, exploring the city's historical immigrant neighborhoods with some students and a fellow teacher. I like the city because of its fascinating history, beautiful architecture, cultural offerings and its sometimes glorious beauty.

But New York City has a dark and dirty side, which this picture made on the subway platform yesterday morning pretty well sums up for me.

You see this sort of display all over the place in NYC and it reminds me that it's terribly hard for large cities to actually be communities where people take care of one another and their common spaces. I'll no doubt have more to say on this, but for now it seems this picture pretty well sums it up.