SPIDER: In New York, concrete jungle where dreams are made of

Dear cold weather lovers,

I'm starting to hate the cold weather; the dormant Viet genes are starting to kick in. Notice that all the major settlements of Viet people in the U.S. happen to be in the more tropical regions. So this re-release is inspired by my crappy heater that I probably won't ever be able to get fixed properly. The problem is that about every 5th time it turn on, the air conditioner also kicks on with it, canceling the warmth. The maintenance guy can only see that the heater is working when he comes out to try to fix it.

Even if he were to try to fix the odd times that the AC turns on with the heat, there would be no way to see if his work was successful, since the heat comes on 4 out of 5 times, and he would leave when he feels it blowing hot air. So I've resorted to manually turning on and off the heat, checking after each time that the air is warm.

Anyway, the other reason for this specific re-release is that it mentions my brief, 3-year stint in Brooklyn, NY. A friend had just posted a picture of her sixth grade class on Facebook, and had tagged me as an MIA. Rightly so, because I wasn't in Brooklyn for 6th grade; I was there for 7th through 9th.

Also a couple of peeps from middle school added me on Facebook. So if you're reading this, cheers. This was the secret I've been keeping from you all those years.

--

Tue, Nov 7, 2009

I hate Jay-Z by the way. Every time I hear his voice, I change the radio station. Except when it's Big Pimpin because my favorite group from the South, UGK, are on there too. So I'll quote a couple of lyrics when it serves my purpose even if I think he is overrated.

This morning was the first time my heater turned on. I woke up when it felt like icicles were dangling off that special place underneath my blanket. The apartment's old, and the central heating is even older. The thermostat read '65'. My ass--it was like more like 55. Though cheapness has been ingrained and beaten into me by my parents, I'm not that cheap; I had set the temperature for 70. I had to hit the wall around the heater to get it to turn on. Corporal punishment does work.

The heat was on for 2 hours and still the thermostat didn't increase but 2 degrees. My apartment is about 850 sq ft, but it still shouldn't take that long.

And so it reminded me of my internment (imprisonment) in New York (because it's cold as hell there, if hell is cold). I won't go into detail about how it came about, but long story short, it was because of Dad.

New York in TV is nothing like it is in real life. It sucks to live there when you're poor. It sucks when you're poor and you came from Houston, where the cost of living is so much less. It sucks when you're 12 and going through puberty and you're forced to endure, 'Where are your cowboy boots?' by a bunch of idiot Brooklyn kids.

'If you don't like it so much here, why don't you go back to Texas?'

'MF, I would if I could. I didn't choose this f--king life. I didn't choose this f--king city.'

Those words were to foreshadow the internal conflict I had experienced a few months back. But at least this time around, I did have a choice, and I chose to leave. That's why I'm in Dallas. I love Houston, but you have to leave things that cause you to die inside, even if they are your blood.

In New York, they don't have central air conditioning or central heating in residences. Only large supermarkets have central temperature control. For people not in Texas and its neighboring states, what is 'central temperature control'? It's where you have a thermostat that you set to control the temperature (both hot and cold) for the entire apartment or floor. It is an utterly foreign concept for New Yorkers.

So what does New York do for temperature control? They have radiators and window units. It's the dark ages up there. Apartments with central temperature start at 2 million, because the ones that cost 1 million are still 600 sq foot sh-tholes.

Window AC units are the same ones you see in the ghetto part of Houston, like on those wooden houses on Wheeler facing the University of Houston. Radiators? I've never seen a radiator south of the Mason-Dixon line. It looks like many loops of cast iron that are connected to two hot water pipes. To turn the sucker on, you actually open the 'faucet' to let the hot water flow into the loops. Then the heat starts to 'radiate' into the room.

As antiquated as it sounds, it actually works well, except that it's an extreme safety hazard. It would certainly heat up a room in less than two hours. Just don't try to cook an egg on it, as you'll get your daily requirements of iron and lead from the paint that keeps peeling off.

---

My time in Brooklyn was probably one of the most difficult times of my life. Going through puberty is unquestionably not very fun. It's doubly difficult moving to another place, trying to start a new group of friends when you are an outsider and people laugh when you say ya'll (it feels odd to actually type ya'll, but I say it all the time). It was a very socially awkward time.

Most would argue that I'm still socially awkward, which I won't entirely deny. But I'll use my patented feel-good mantra (that I say in my head), 'Shut up, I'm a doctor, and I make more money than you do.' And if I make less, I'll say, 'Shut up, you bourgeois trash,' and run home with my tail between my legs. The mantra only works if you make a salary in the upper quartile.