Archive for the 'History' Category

And what a night it was! Hosted by Lolita Bar in the NEW Lower East Side, all the classies and the flashies, the Vera Wangs and Chanel Diors of the City on Broome st. and Allen, where 250 Russian Jewish immigrants probably stuffed themselves into a Bell Jar tenements with a single air shaft and no bathrooms.

DAMN YOU, COOL KIDS!! AND ALL THE CONSPICUOUS WEALTH THAT THAT THERIN IMPLY!!

But this past Wednesday night was weighted heavily, or perhaps uplifted by a geekitude of absolutely honor and respectability: Urban Lore, and Knowledge of your City.

And with multi-colored, custom silk-screened T-shirts (thank you, Ad Hoc Arts.) the NYC Titans of Trivia All Stars were ready to take home the crown: A group of hotshot mostly NYC Tour Guides, helmed by The Levy family of Levy’s Unique New York. Their secret weapon, A living NYC Encyleopedia named Andy Sydor aka The RedMenace; both for his politics and fo the color of his head when he’s riled up.

(He’s the Union Shop Steward of Grey Line (The Red Buses) and if you ever want to get deluged with emailed articles about NYC by the DOZEN, email him: RedMenace@aol.com)

At a table in the back, surrounded by Wheat Beers (brought to New York by German Immigrants, mostly in Bushwick) and Pale Ale (from the Colonial Day, of course) and got going on the questions.

And BOY there were some stumpers. . . 6 categories, including

Old Names: (6th avenue used to be known as the West Road.)

It Happened Here: (The Hot Dog, invented in Coney Island in 1904)

On this date: ( Dec 8, 1980: John Lennon shot and killed. May 25, 1883: Opening of the Brooklyn Bridge)

and. . . lots of other very obscure stuff. . . The beer was flowing pretty heavily by then. Some very apocriphal stuff (I heard it this way!) and the occassional reference to something outside the city got the crowd into an uproar. But, when trivia geeks get fired up about something, the gloves are off. I should know. . .

(Triviacrats: RIP [for now]. . . SOB SOB SOB. . .)

The photo round was frustrating, as they were small, grainy photo-copys from the City Lore book in a dark bar when people were drinking.

But after Craig Finn of the excellent band The Hold Steady read off the 60th questions, the scores were tallied and the

NYC TITANS OF TRIVIA ALL-STARS CAME IN. . .

2nd place. . .

After Kevin Walsh and the Triborough Destroyers beat us by a single question. Ladies and Gentlement, Kevin Walsh is the Moby Dick of NYC Trivia. . .

Next time, Walsh. . .

Next time. . . . . . . .

Blue and white colored Fifth Avenue yesterday for the 76th Annual Greek Independence Day Parade, dedicated to religious freedom. Greek Americans from throughout the TriState area lined 61st to 76th streets to celebrate their heritage — and the fact that for the first time ever the largest Greek parade outside of Greece was televised.

Anna Vissi was the Honorary Marshal. The Cyprus-born pop star (sometimes referred
to as “The Greek Madonna”) has sold 9.5 million albums across the world.

American Idol’s Constantine Maroulis was also there. Maroulis’ grandparents immigrated from Greece to the States in the 1920s, and he himself grew up in Brooklyn and Wyckoff, New Jersey.

Guiding Light star Frank Dicopoulos was another celebrity present.

Honored guests included the Hellenic Navy Band and Evzones (Greece’s elite Presidential Guard).

Government officials from Greece and the US were also there.

Greek-Americans Ernie Anastos and Nick Gregory hosted the event, along with fellow newsanchor Rosanna Scotto. Although they are Fox 5 correspondents, the parade actually aired on WWOR-TV My9.

What I want to know is, is it “uncool” to be Greek in America? Why did it take so long for the Greek parade to be televised when both the St. Patrick’s Day parade and the Puerto Rican Day parade are televised? After all, as one float pointed out, Greece is the foundation of civiliazation.

The first Greek came to the United States in 1528, and there are now around 3,000,000 Americans of Greek descent, most of whom live in New York, according to world’s best source for user-contributed knowledge, Wikipedia.

Some of the most famous Greek Americans include:

Were you at the parade? Did you see it on TV? Let us know what you think about the reflection of Greek Americans in the media.

I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art today to check out the special exhibition Hatshepsut: From Queen to Pharaoh. With the exception of learning her personal story, which is pretty fascinating, the exhibit wasn’t really that exciting. It looked like every other exhibit I’ve ever seen about mummies, except that there were no actual mummies.

One thing I did notice was that there were a lot more ‘girly items’ on display, which was kind of fun. There was all kinds of jewelry; rings, bracelets, cuffs, armbands, necklaces, belly-necklaces, ornate clasps, collars, rings, earrings and a diadem(a decorative headpiece). There were also a couple of jewelry boxes a some other toiletries, like powder boxes, kohl jars and applicators, combs, tweezers, ointment jars, cosmetic jars, cosmetic spoons (which were purely decorative and meant to be ‘cute’), hand mirrors and even a razor(yes, hers — did they shave their legs back then?).

Overall, I’d say don’t go out of your way to go to this exhibit, but if you’re in the Met anyway, wander through it. It runs until July 9th, and be sure to download The Special Exhibition Podcast to your iPod (cheaper than the $6 they charge there).

[Just in case you are lame like me and don’t know how to subscribe to a podcast, here’s how to do it (in iTunes): 1) click on Podcasts in the left menu 2) choose advanced from the top menu 3)choose subscribe to podcast and 4)paste in the URL (the one above, that ends in .xml) ]