A walk in a rundown part of the city...

[Kyriakos]

At Christmas eve i was walking - for half an hour- in an area of this city where i very likely have never been before. It used to be the railway station, although there is a new one since a decade or so ago, and the old one now is just a massive storage facility which seems to be slowly rusting. A continuous wall prevents you from entering, and thus i had to walk for 20 minutes just to go past it.
Pavements were empty, and only cars would go by. The tall apartment buildings to the other side would show no life behind still curtains past the windows, or clothes hanging from some balcony.

I suppose this is what Detroit must look like

-Ever been in such a part of a city? Well, assuming you aren't unlucky enough to live there...

 

[GoodEnoughForMe]

I've walked all through Detroit, Chicago southside, and the rundown parts of some Asian cities like KL and HCMC. Mostly, people severely overestimate the danger. That doesn't make the blight and endemic poverty all the less striking, but people act like the places are warzones, when they're populated by regular people just like any other part of the city.

 

[AppleDumplingHead]

I've walked all through Detroit, Chicago southside, and the rundown parts of some Asian cities like KL and HCMC. Mostly, people severely overestimate the danger. That doesn't make the blight and endemic poverty all the less striking, but people act like the places are warzones, when they're populated by regular people just like any other part of the city.

I can't speak for the other cities, but in Chicago, they probably thought you were a cop or something equally non-pleasant. People who live in south Chicago are hyper-aware of their surroundings, as a higher innate sense of situational awareness. Whether or not they had actually seen you, personally, before, you likely stood out like a sore thumb and unless you were walking slowly, looking very lost, or trying to associate with people you didn't know, everyone else turned around or even physically moved away because you just didn't belong.

Most of the violence in Chicago (and there's a lot of it) is gang related or domestic. Though life is cheap to some of the people there, they're not looking to include some stranger, whose victimization is going to include hell raining down on them. Much of the violence is rivalry and people caught in the middle, and who knows, you scaring them may have saved a couple lives.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Why the assumption "you likely stood out like a sore thumb"? I've walked through parts of LA that could be called "run down" as well as that south side of Chicago, and some probably sketchy areas in a few other cities while traveling by Greyhound (the 'hound station seldom seems to be in the best part of town). I don't believe that "I don't know you on sight" is enough to trigger "so I'll cross the street when you pass" at all. That wouldn't be situational awareness, that would be abject paranoia.

I wouldn't walk those streets in a Brooks Brothers while checking the time on a Rolex, but I'm with GEFM. Those people are just like any other people, and it isn't terribly hard to fit in.

 

[AppleDumplingHead]

Why the assumption "you likely stood out like a sore thumb"? I've walked through parts of LA that could be called "run down" as well as that south side of Chicago, and some probably sketchy areas in a few other cities while traveling by Greyhound (the 'hound station seldom seems to be in the best part of town). I don't believe that "I don't know you on sight" is enough to trigger "so I'll cross the street when you pass" at all. That wouldn't be situational awareness, that would be abject paranoia.

I wouldn't walk those streets in a Brooks Brothers while checking the time on a Rolex, but I'm with GEFM. Those people are just like any other people, and it isn't terribly hard to fit in.

You, likely, would have a similar experience. I can tell from your improper use of slang regarding urban environments.

No one says "run down" about urban blight. "Run down" is the details of a plan or event.
No one says "sketchy" about an area, but a person.
No one says "hound" referring to a bus. It's a horny person or a person who won't shut up.
No one says "trigger" outside of discussing a firearm, and it's an unpleasant lead in to aggressiveness.

People aren't going to cross the street, they're going to look down, turn around or go inside.

In that environment, you'd be the "crazy white boy". I just don't think you have the experience or qualification to invalidate my position.

 

[Zelig]

My city doesn't have run down areas.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

You, likely, would have a similar experience. I can tell from your improper use of slang regarding urban environments.

No one says "run down" about urban blight. "Run down" is the details of a plan or event.
No one says "sketchy" about an area, but a person.
No one says "hound" referring to a bus. It's a horny person or a person who won't shut up.
No one says "trigger" outside of discussing a firearm, and it's an unpleasant lead in to aggressiveness.

People aren't going to cross the street, they're going to look down, turn around or go inside.

In that environment, you'd be the "crazy white boy". I just don't think you have the experience or qualification to invalidate my position.

LOL...wow, you are just so in the urban scene that I bow to your arrogance. You are clearly a valid predictor of my experience. Oh, wait, it's experience therefore no predictor is necessary. You are dismissed.

By the way, "run down" comes from the topic at hand and wasn't an attempt to "sound urban." I don't try to sound anything. I find that just being my fairly ordinary self gets me through quite handily. If I were trying to sound something in particular, I'd be using the word buffoon.

Anyway, you skipped answering the simple question. "Fit in" doesn't mean "act like I live here." It means not send the "natives" scurrying for cover the way you seem to think happens. Perhaps that's your experience, and just a reflection of your glowing magnificence, but ordinary people don't react that way to ordinary people just because they aren't neighbors.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

[QUOTE = "Kyriakos, post: 14611620, member: 36763"]

-Ever been in such a part of a city? Well, assuming you aren't unlucky enough to live there...[/QUOTE]

Yeah. Where I used to live in eastern Germany is actually pretty close to that description.. Just more.. German. More tiny gardens, tacky grandma-esque decoration Kitsch, tasteless curtains, too many butchers and kebabs. I loved it, personally. Had real character. It helped that most of the population was a mix of grandmas and refugees, a real melting pot. So many abandoned buildings.. I love these kind of places. They've got some special kind of magic.

 

[Silurian]

I was walking in east London once, in a run down area, and these two men were stripping a car. It was up on block as someone had taken all the wheels.

One of them asked if I wanted the battery, I said no thanks. They carried on stripping the car.

Im from two hundred miles from there, and so have a completly different accent but they did not feel threatened or want to run away.

 

[Kyriakos]

South of the Thames (or Waterloo) = different city

 

[Silurian]

No this was north. In Silvertown.

 

[Kyriakos]

^North of zone2 = different city

 

[Silurian]

No not north of zone two.
Not sure what that has to do with anything anyway.

 

[Kyriakos]

Outside of Bayswater/good parts of zone 1+2 = different city

 

[Silurian]

So what part of rundown Kensington Victoria is the thread about.

I know there is someplaces off Spur Road in need of repair.

 

[Kyriakos]

Sorry, i meant that (for me) London looked rather unsafe outside of zones 1,2 and nice parts. I was 18-21 at the time, though...

 

[Silurian]

London is a very variable city.
you can walk a few hundred metres and go from a rich area to poor.

The incident with the battery happened when I was 22.
But I am not scarred of walking around rough parts of the UK.
Just look like you know where you are going.

About the same time a freind and I walked from Woolwich, SE London out to Swanley a town just outside London before the M25.
We walked in to the town centre via a council estate. It was very strange because nearly every house seem to have at least one shopping trolley in the front garden.