“New York, concrete jungle where dreams are made. There’s nothing you can’t do.” Alicia Keys said it herself; New York is the home to fulfilling dreams and aspirations. The skyscrapers, the bright lights, the 4 a.m. bars, the fancy restaurants, the shopping and just about everything else. New York is arguably the best city in the United States. Strolling below the skyscrapers and seated in the fancy restaurants, besides annoying tourists, are the infamous, stereotyped and most of the time hated New Yorkers.
I never noticed how bad New Yorkers were perceived until I went to school in another state, when asked, “Where are you from?” I always reply, “New York,” and get a distasteful look or slick comment. Why does everyone have a problem with New Yorkers?
The more I come back home to New York to visit I can see why we’re perceived the way we are. When I listen to conversations on the train or simply people watch, I observe that New Yorkers think we are better than everyone else. Why do we think this way? Well, let’s start off by saying when you grow up in elementary school and learn about the U.S. they teach you that New York is the best place to be. Then, as you get older and notice that you live in a place that people pay extreme amounts of money to come see Times Square (a place you can in 45 minutes), and realize you were born in the city of dreams.
I had a professor from Brooklyn tell the class one time that for half of her life she knew there was New York and San Francisco and everything else was just fillers in between. When her son went to school in Chicago she said, “Wow, there is somewhere in between New York and San Francisco that isn’t filler land.”
The bright lights and fancy things aren’t the only thing that persuades New Yorkers to think that we are the best. Our sense of fashion is above and beyond many other regions, especially because we’re the only fashion capital in the United States. Traveling to school alone, I used to see big mink coats, pumps on every other person, trendy hairstyles; The streets of New York are literally a fashion show. To make things better, pretty much every high fashion magazine or fashion company is based in New York, not to mention every other great company (which explains why everyone has a summer internship in New York).
I always hear so many complaints about New York weather. I’ve even heard ignorant statements like “Does it even get hot there?” Yes, we’ve had 100 degree weather before believe it or not, and we’ve had zero degree weather with piles of snow. What does our weather have to do with anything? We have the luxury of knowing how to dress in every season not just spring, summer and sometimes fall months. We know how to rock the hell out of some fur and over the knee boots and we can also throw on a dress a few months later and still kill it. Who wants to be hot all year round anyway? That’s what vacations during the winter are for.
In addition to all of the amazingness we were born into, we have the luxury of living in a city during summers where people want to intern without staying on NYU’s campus for a few months. Going to work in New York, I can be seated next to the CEO of a top brand on the train (it’s happened before). When I’m down south at school the most I “network” off of campus is with a Wal-Mart employee, but don’t get me wrong, there are tons of networking opportunities on campus.
Besides networking with extremely important people, we produced some of the best rappers in the Hip-Hop industry ever. We ran every era of Hip-Hop because we birthed it from Run D.M.C, to LL Cool J, to Nas and Notorious B.I.G. Not to mention we are still dominating the Hip-Hop industry with Jay-Z and Nicki Minaj, two artists that continuously top charts nationwide.
I can go on and on about why us New Yorkers “think” we’re the better than everyone else and walk around with our heads held high. It’s not just being cocky. We just have pride in where we are from and are taught that we should be. So, next time you throw shade at the north, remember where you got your outfit inspiration from (New York Fashion Week?), or where your dream job is located, or even your favorite rapper. It was probably, yes,I'll say it again, New York.
