In an unusual turn of events, Gary and I had a free day in New York City. The weather forecast was perfect – sunshine, no humidity, high temperature in the low 70s. I had an idea for what we should do with this unexpected free time. “Let’s go explore Brighton Beach,” I suggested.
Brighton Beach is a neighborhood in Brooklyn. It has been nicknamed “Little Odessa,” because it is home to many immigrants from Russia and Ukraine and it is by the sea (like its namesake on the coast of the Black Sea in sadly what is now war-torn Ukraine).
Usually, Gary turns his nose up at Brooklyn – it is a running joke between us. He thinks Queens is the far superior borough since that is where he grew up. It is true that when we were children more of Brooklyn was impoverished and crime-ridden; Queens had some unsafe areas, too, but more of it was middle- to upper-middle class residential neighborhoods. It has been a lot of years though since Brooklyn recovered, gentrified and became the favored place to live among hipsters and artists. Brooklyn still has rough areas, but it is nothing like it was in the ‘70s. So much has changed since I lived there.
To my surprise, Gary agreed to my proposal. He was curious about it, too. I did a bit of research online about restaurants and sites. We decided to drive, though public transportation is readily available, because it would give us more flexibility. One advantage to visiting the outer boroughs, especially if you aren’t intimidated by the prospect of driving through the streets, is that you can find free parking. Anyone who has had a car in Manhattan knows what an expensive proposition parking can be. We waited until rush hour was over, around 10:00 a.m., and headed to Brooklyn.
I can’t remember the last time I drove to Brooklyn. We headed downtown along the west side of Manhattan and went through the Hugh Carey Tunnel. Back in the day we called it the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel. I took that tunnel many times with my family when we came to Manhattan to visit either of Dad’s sisters.
We emerged from the tunnel in Brooklyn and proceeded onto the Gowanus (an elevated highway with a lot of truck traffic). I remember it as a depressed industrial area on one side of that highway and residential on the other. The residential side looked better maintained and the other side seemed to have new developments, some of which was still industrial, but the area looked more vibrant than when I had last seen it.
The Gowanus took us to the Belt Parkway, the roadway that travels along the edge of Brooklyn, skirting the entrance to New York harbor and then Jamaica Bay. We passed under the Verrazzano Bridge. I thought about how big Brooklyn is and I remembered getting around the borough as a teenager on buses. There was a store not that far from the Verrazzano, Korvettes, that had good prices on records. My brother Steven, who had a huge record collection, would give me a list of albums he wanted for his birthday, and I would go to Korvettes to pick one out for him. It was quite a schlep– involving several different buses. I didn’t mind, though, riding through various neighborhoods and looking at the people and stores. Korvettes is long gone, now a Kohls and Target sit in its spot. Some things change but remain the same.
We exited the parkway and made our way to Brighton Beach Avenue, looking for parking. We noted many fruit and vegetable stands, and spotted a market bearing the name of the capital of Uzbekistan, Tashkent.
The influx of Russian and Ukranian immigrants to Brighton Beach began a long time ago in the 1970s. When the Soviet Union relaxed its prohibition on Jews leaving, many of them found their way to Brooklyn, especially to Brighton Beach. Then when the Soviet Union dissolved in the early 1990s another wave came – this time from the former Soviet Republics such as Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Georgia, etc. The new immigrants established shops along Brighton Beach Avenue catering to their tastes.
We found an unmetered parking spot on a residential side street. The Riegelmann Boardwalk runs along the beach – named after Peter Riegelmann, the Brooklyn Borough President in the 1920s – it stretches almost three miles through Brighton Beach past Coney Island. We got on the boardwalk where it starts and meandered almost the full length of it, passing iconic landmarks like the Cyclone, Nathan’s and the renovated aquarium. It was not yet noon, so it was quiet, everything was just opening. We passed a few fellow walkers, joggers and fishermen/women. We heard a polyglot of languages being spoken, including Yiddish. The sky was clear, there was a warm breeze, and the water glistened in the sunshine. We stopped to watch the waves breaking on the shore. Only a few umbrellas dotted the sand – public schools in New York City had opened that day so there weren’t very many people.
We reached a very long fishing pier, walked out to take in the view, and then turned around and started back.
We got off the boardwalk and went up to the avenue to look at the variety of stores and find a restaurant for lunch. The sidewalks were crowded with shoppers and merchandise. Elevated train tracks provided shade for the sidewalk. Periodically we heard the screech of the subway above us.
We looked at a few menus posted in windows and selected a restaurant that offered traditional Eastern European fare. We decided on the Ocean View Café, the menu was in what we thought was Russian (or maybe it was Ukranian) but it had English translations.
There were just a few empty tables, so it seemed to be a popular place for the locals who were speaking a Slavic language to the waitstaff. We ordered stuffed cabbage as an appetizer, chicken kebab with mashed potato and cheese blintzes, we shared each dish. The food was excellent.
We left the restaurant and were grateful to have a bit of a walk to the car. The cherry on top of our great day was that we didn’t hit much traffic heading back into Manhattan, only one bottleneck. Gary and I agreed it was a terrific outing. We timed it just right – nothing was too crowded, but it wasn’t desolate, the weather was an ideal example of late summer perfection, and we felt like we had visited another country – all while in New York City.
Stories I Tell Myself 