Best of Both Worlds Uptown & Downtown

Amanda Miller  Eng 112.                                                                      9/1/17

Best of Both Worlds Uptown & Downtown in NYC

I am from New York City! When you are from New York City, you often hear it's nickname " the city that never sleeps" "if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere". New York City is made up of five boroughs, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island, and the Bronx. Every borough is diverse, and consist of many different races and ethnicities. New York City is the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Everyone in New York City is working toward a goal, making their dreams come true, counting on the opportunities we offer. We have a lot of freedom, and the right to make positive or negative decisions toward our own individual lives. You can be from any of the five boroughs in New York City, and any race or religion and still obtain self actualization, which is your fullest level of potential.

I live in Uptown New York City, which is considered the Bronx, New York. The everyday commute for a uptown New Yorker would be using mass transit such as, the MTA bus, Subway and railroad New York City transit systems, if you don't have a car. When traveling to Brooklyn or Manhattan, noone likes to drive because of the traffic and limited parking options, we are lucky to have the the transit system to get us downtown or uptown faster.

When communting, you become a tourist in your own city here, aside from all the other ongoing distractions of everyday life. You realize the Bronx is not as maintained as Manhattan. You see the struggles of those who live uptown New York City as oppose to those living downtown New York City. The Bronx has a lot of poor communities, shelters, and ghomeless. "The poorest neighborhoods in the Bronx, New York are also the cities poorest." Some parts of Brooklyn has poor communities that are looked down upon as well. As you travel downtown Manhattan, you start to see more caucasion people as oppose to African Americans and Latinos, in my opinion. Do you ever wonder, why is that ? Have you ever wondered why the subway is rushed with caucasion folks at like 116th or 110th street? Let's be real, is it because they'd rather live downtown, or is it because they can afford to ? Ignorant people think their supposed to. There is also the gentrified parts of Brooklyn, which is middle class mixed with low income. Regardless of the class, everyone is doing something to survive in New York City.

Here in New York City, lower income neighborhoods have advantages such as government assistance, for those who chose to take that route. There are also colleges in all five boroughs for pursuing careers in all fields, and businesses for those that are unemployed. As a New Yorker, I know that government assistance is a choice not an accomplishment. You can decide which route you want to take. There are two sides to being in New York City, Poverty and Wealth. Once you see New York as that, you can then decide which life you want to live, and what you'll do to pursue it.

Education is very important in all 5 boroughs of New York City. It is the only key to success all races have here. The more you know, you can accomplish. Through education government assistance is not necessary. Today in low income communities in New York City we are educating and encouraging our youth, to educate themselves as much as possible, and to stay in school and attend college. We are not dwelling as New Yorkers, on the negatives of the city and of the world, but we are turning negatives into positives.  No one individual in New York City is faced with an obstacle he or she can't overcome.  Living in New York it's not about the negative outlook on race, and class, especially when we have to first want to get out of the low income neighborhoods we live in. New York City has always been about being educated in all aspects. Some of us are given options, and others are not aware of the options they have. If you live uptown or downtown, the one option we all have here in New York is our education. Success has no race, and it is not race which separates us, but our level of education.




Work Cited
http://mycrains.crainsnewyork.com/stats-and-the-city/2013/bronx/bronxs-poorest-neighborhoods