Chi-Town's Chinatown

Chicago's Chinatown

Saddle up, friends. Today is Chinese New Year and the first day of the Year of the Horse. In honor of this day, I'm sharing some pics of Chicago's Chinatown neighborhood. These pics were taken this past summer, in July or August 2013, on an ordinary weekday in Chinatown. No celebratory firecrackers or dragon dancers, no bad luck spirits needing chasing away, no festivals of lovely lit lanterns. Just Chicago people going about their day in one of the city's better-known south-side neighborhoods.

Summer's day on the streets of Chicago's Chinatown

Looking north on Wentworth Avenue

Of course, it would be great to have some pictures of the firecracking fun going on in Chicago's Chinatown today. But as with every Chinese New Year in Chicago, it's just simply too cold for a street party. It's for this reason I was thrilled to witness a Chinese New Year celebration in Melbourne, Australia, a few years ago. Winter in Chicago is summer in Melbourne. And the summer I was in Melbourne was a genuine scorcher. In honor of the new year, Melbourne's Chinatown was filled with smoke and drumbeats and dancing dragons and swathes of red. It was so much fun, I nearly forgot I was sweating like a horse the whole time...or like an ox (2009's animal, thank you very much). If you'd like a glimpse of what Chinese New Year celebrations look like in warm-weather climates, check out my post on A Melbourne Chinese New Year. Otherwise, enjoy these pics of Chicago's own Chinatown.

Greetings!

The World Is A Commonwealth

Meet me by the peacock

Cannibal cat

All together now...

Benevolent

Fruits for sale

Street watchers

Your lunch

Vegetables for sale

Beauty

Entering Wentworth's Chinatown, sponsored by McDonald's

Saluting hometown heroes

Looking north, red line el tracks running along

Lychees

Church guard

Emperor's Choice

The Pui Tak Center, Chinatown, Chicago

Ice Town, U.S.A.

First off, apologies to any of you who came to this post expecting a tribute to Ben Wyatt, former boy mayor, teenage ice clown, and human disaster on Parks and Rec. I'm a big fan of the show too, so I'll understand your disappointment.

Earlier this week my city got sucked into the grips of a vortex. A polar vortex to be exact. You may have heard about it, and yes, it was as scary as it sounds. Temperatures in Chicago dipped 10 to 15 degrees below 0 on Monday, with the wind chill at 30 to 40 degrees below 0. What's more, this post-apocalyptic phase was preceded by bombardments of snowfall for hours on end beginning on New Year's Eve. Happy 2014, Chicago!!

Snow on State St., downtown Chicago

The Chicago River, Jan. 8, 2014

Chicagoans are truly tough people--among the toughest I know. And the long, hard winters we have to endure are a big factor in the resilience and strength of the people here. It's extremely rare for this city to shut down over anything--so you know things must have been bad this week for the city and suburban schools to close for a couple days along with a number of city offices and businesses. (By contrast, I've been in other towns and cities--cough, Carbondale, IL, cough--that shut down when they get half an inch of snow, and I've seen friends in warmer parts of the U.S. and in Ireland and the U.K. freak out on Facebook over a full inch of snow and 30 degree Fahrenheit temps. Wow.)

Snow-covered sidewalk, State St.

Sit yourself down...in the snow. An outdoor bench in downtown Chicago.

Probably ditched for a cab. In front of Harold Washington Library.

A friend of mine from Ireland/England was in town with his fiancee in the midst of this Chiberian weather, bravely driving all the way from Ohio on Sunday. Needless to say, it was too cold for them to do much sightseeing. The city went into deep freeze mode, and everyone here went into temporary hibernation, the only safe and sensible thing to do in such truly dangerous weather. God help those people in the region with no homes and those animals living outside.

No kidding.

Stay alive.

On Wednesday I managed to meet up with my friends downtown. It was 10 to 15 degrees that day, but in the wake of the polar vortex it felt almost tropical. I wandered around for as long as I could outside downtown and snapped a few pictures. These shots aren't as impressive as many of the ones you can see online of Chicago trapped in ice--for those kind of pics, go here and here--but if you think I was gonna go traipsing around the lakefront in below zero temps just for a photo then you're crazier than the people who did go traipsing around the lakefront in below zero temps just for a photo this week. Like these people:

Chicago on Jan. 6, 2014, pic by Chris Walker, Chicago Tribune.

In the last couple days, life has returned to usual in Chicago. As I write this, it's somewhere in the mid-30s at 10 PM. That's more in line with what we're used to in this part of world in January. Yes, it's still cold--the kind of cold where you can see your breath when you exhale, but those are breaths of relief.

Caution.

Falling ice.

Potential headache.

Watch out.

Safety first.

Evening icicles.

State Street, going north.

State Street, going south.

Where there's smoke, there's heat.

Shadow on ice.

With my friend Stephen, warming up.

Bundled up by a fire.

Year of the Link

There's nothing like starting off the day and a new year with a great message. Something lovely and inspiring and life-affirming.

For that reason, I hesitate to post anything on big holidays, especially a holiday with such a high-expectation, wipe-the-slate weight to it as New Year's Day. There's a pressure to post something really profound or witty or original on days with such meaning to them, and I never feel as if anything I have to say cuts the mustard.

I was gonna share a photo with a lovely quote on it about flight from Leonardo da Vinci--until I did some fact checking (it's the former encyclopedia editor in me) and found out da Vinci never said or wrote any such thing. (As I see more and more of these memes and stuff making the rounds on social media, I believe less and less that any of them are accurately attributed, or even quoted. Along with da Vinci, I've seen statements falsely attributed to Oscar Wilde, Marilyn Monroe, Albert Einstein, Rumi, Mark Twain--some of them blatantly out of character and time to the person who is supposed to have said them.) So that leaves me falling back on my own ordinary words and ordinary pictures again.

After thinking it over much of the day, I still can't think of anything worthy of the meaning of the holiday. Anything other than "Happy 2014!!" And also "Thank you" to anyone who's been reading my posts and other work and offering me encouragement and feedback. I appreciate it.

Thank you especially to the person who sent me a personal message and greeting today, to let me know she's been following my blog as she makes her own travels through such places as India and Tanzania and Bhutan on an environmental/agricultural fellowship. It was really unexpected to get a nice message from a total stranger (albeit a fellow wayfaring woman)--and it totally made my day and put a smile on my face. Her name is Lauren, and I've been looking over her own blog and wanted to share the link here. Especially as it looks like she's been doing some really important and interesting work during her recent travels. Here's the link to her blog: There and Back Again: the World Travels of a Watson Fellow. Please take a look. And thank you so much for your thoughtful message, Lauren!

I've been meaning in fact to share a few links lately, so I might as well do that now. This is gonna be the year of the link. Get ready. ;-)

I've made the decision to shut down my personal social media accounts on places like Facebook and Twitter, as they tend to be big time wasters as well as negative triggers for me. I've already shut down my personal Facebook account, and Twitter will go down soon. Instead I've reopened a LinkedIn account last week to help me in finding and sharing freelance writing and editing work. Here's my LinkedIn profile if you'd like to connect to me there.

I also created a Clippings.me profile that compiles some of my publications into an online portfolio. Still adding to it, but it's a good, easy reference to most of my recent writings. Here's the link to my Clippings portfolio. 

If you're hungering for some beautiful writing today (and who isn't), here's a story I like to share. Not one of my own, of course. It's by Laurie Gough, and it's a truly haunting and lovely story about her month spent living on a beach on a Greek island, and a mysterious and life-affirming encounter she had there. It's called Naxos Nights. Check it out.

Finally, here's a picture of me in the snow. We got a ton of it last night and today. Happy Snowy New Year from Chicago, world!

Clear eyes, full heart, red scarf, furry hat--can't lose. ;-)