Chinatown: Stop letting the other ’hoods use me. If they don’t want to meet for dim sum during the day, then they can take their club beats elsewhere at night. And tell Nolita to quit invading my space.Photo by Christopher Schoenbohm

Look at you, New York! I hardly recognize this group of non-smoking, exercising, healthy-eating and organized individuals. What happened? You used to be fun. Interesting, at least.

The truth is, if everyone in New York sticks to their resolutions, it could throw off the balance of this entire city, country and world at large. Grocery stores will sell out of fresh produce, and SeamlessWeb will go under faster than it can send a confirmation email. Gyms will become so overcrowded that citywide riots will break out in a moment of elliptical desperation. Cigarette companies will—er, bad example.

Countless livelihoods depend on your laziness, unhealthy habits and destructive behaviors. Think of the artisan baker who relies on your sweet tooth to pay the bills. Don’t you believe in supporting small businesses? Don’t you want to stimulate the economy? Or how about the bartender who depends on your liquored-up generosity to support his true passion? Thanks to your selfish resolution to drink less, you may be robbing the world of his future Oscar-winning documentary exposing the slaughter of bonobos in the Congo. Maybe that film would have started a worldwide movement to save the bonobos from extinction. Perhaps even inspired an end to the Congo’s years of devastating warfare in the process. Don’t you want to end violence in the Congo? Don’t you think bonobos are cute?

So go ahead and smoke your first cigarette of 2013. Bite that hangnail. Fall so hard off the donut wagon that you might have broken something if not for their—and your—pillowy softness to cushion the landing. It’s the least you can do.

Our neighborhoods, however, are another story. They could use a few resolutions, and from the look of things, they have their work cut out for them in 2013:

Meatpacking: Drink lesssss [hiccup]. And learn Italian.

Chelsea: Stop making fun of MiMa. He didn’t make it up.

West Village: Start growing vegetables on the roofs of my restaurants. Oh wait, that was last year’s.

Midtown: Separate my work from my social life. Leave my Blackberry at—sorry, gotta take this … What? Now? I’m just finishing a scorpion bowl with my boys at BroJim’s. I’ll be at the office in 10.

East Village: Keep my beard clean.

Tribeca: Stop letting myself be defined by my friends. Tell De Niro I need some space. Again.

Nolita: Stop giving all the other neighborhoods adorably personalized gifts from my shops. When did anyone ever give me a necklace made of gilded flower petals in the shape of my name?

Little Italy: Go gluten-free.

Murray Hill (hers): Stop wearing my Kappa Delta Phi butt pants to unlimited champagne brunch.

Murray Hill (his): Stop hitting on girls wearing Kappa Delta Phi butt pants at unlimited champagne brunch.

Times Square: Meditate more. Like, all the time.

Photo by Wilson Rivera, courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons.

When most New Yorkers think of Canal Street, they probably don’t think of quality retail. There the goods tend to come rolled out on street vendor mats with the brands misspelled, not behind glass windows in fine shopping plazas.

Melinda Miller of Winick Realty Group, however, wants to usher in a new era for the downtown commercial street famous for its open storefronts, questionable electronic imports and tourist-grabbing counterfeits.

“For Canal Street, it’s a question of when, not if, the neighborhood will see its moment as the next great retail destination in the city,” she said in a recent company statement

Miller is marketing 272-274 Canal Street, a four-story, 1,800 square-feet-per-floor brick building at the northwest corner of Cortlandt Alley next to the new Tribeca Blu Hotel. As it stands, the building is unremarkable, but its owners, the Gindi family, have some big plans for its next retailer: a new glass façade and significant new signage.

“The beauty of Canal Street is that it sits at the apex of several Manhattan neighborhoods — namely Soho, Tribeca, Chinatown, Little Italy, Hudson Square and the Lower East Side,” Miller said in the statement, which added, “The potential for exposure rivals that of virtually any major street in Manhattan.”

Canal Street’s small individual storefronts distinguish it from most of the city’s other highly trafficked shopping districts, where large landlords own large retail spaces. Property owners, business people and the street’s vendors have been tracking the area’s shift towards the city’s more conventional commercialism for years, however.

“Canal is on its last legs,” a watch-peddler told New York Press back in 2010. “They want to make this a franchise block.”

Albert Laboz, a principal with United American Land, a major landlord on the street, agrees. On fashion retailer Necessary Clothing’s recent leasing of 261-263 Canal Street, Laboz told the Real Deal: “It is further evidence that Canal Street is really becoming an extension of Broadway in Soho.”

He said that he could not recall a larger deal in the area over the past decade.

“I think it is slowly starting to change. But I think the city cracking down on the illegal sales [of knockoff products] is going to be the biggest driver,” Ariel Schuster, executive vice president at retail brokerage RKF, told the Real Deal in a separate story on retailer landlords cashing in on Canal Street.

Not everyone shares Miller’s vision of the street as “Manhattan’s next great retail frontier,” however. Michael Glanzberg, a principal with Soho-based brokerage Sinvin Real Estate, for instance, told the Real Deal that he and others believe that higher-paying customers will avoid mixing with Canal’s discounted and knock-off merchants.

“From the standpoint of someone who represents upper-end and high-end retail, Canal Street really holds no place for those folks,” he said. “It is the merchandise. There is a demographic and a shopper on Canal Street that is drastically different from what you find even a block north in Soho.”

Canal Street’s fate is not sealed, in other words, but everyone knows in which direction it currently is headed.

By Anne Kristoff
Anyone who thinks people in New York City don’t know their neighbors has never spent any time with Carmella “Millie” Fazio. On the short walk from the Shrine Church of St. Anthony of Padua on  to her nearby apartment, practically everyone she passes greets her by name—from the mailmen and the laundry delivery guy to the young children just getting out of school for the day and the old-timers she’s known for nearly all of her 83 years. This is Millie’s neighborhood, and she makes one thing clear, “You ain’t moving me out!”

St. Anthony’s stretches across Houston Street from Sullivan to Thompson. It soars upward of 10 stories high and has been a cornerstone in the community since its completion in 1888. It is the oldest existing Italian parish in the United States and was built by the Italian immigrants who once filled the apartments in the surrounding neighborhood.

The building is impressive—voted the second most beautiful church in New York City by Time Out—with slabs of green and white marble encircling the altar and a huge rose window framed by a unique Jardine pipe organ. But despite its magnitude, the church blends seamlessly with the adjacent low-rise former tenement walk-ups, many of which still house the women who make up the St. Anthony’s Seniors Club.

“What you see now in the seniors is the remnant of this very vibrant and active, primarily Italian community,” said Father Joe Lorenzo, who has served as pastor of St. Anthony’s since 2004.

While the church itself had always been the cornerstone of the community, the seniors have become its touchstone. “They were very active,” said Brother Vincent Ciaravino, who started the Seniors Club in 1974 and was at St. Anthony’s for 29 years before transferring to Catskill, NY.

“These were people who were part of the church, they grew up in the parish, their kids went to the parish school and life centered; around the parish. It was a very strong and important part of the people of that area.”

Now in their eighties and nineties, the seniors have outlived parents, siblings and spouses and have endured a variety of changes in the neighborhood, the continual infringement of NYU expansion and the profound scars of 9/11. But they have each other and, like Millie, they are not going anywhere.

“My daughter lives on 82nd Street in Queens and she wanted to fix me a room,” said Frances Ciotta. “But I said no! I’m going from here to the cemetery!”

“I love it here,” said Antonina “Nina” Stagnitta. “I know everybody and everybody knows me. We go here, we go there, we do this and when I don’t have anything thing to do, no place to go and the weather is nice, I either sit here or down by Millie.”

The here and there varies. Some gather at local parks or the supermarket; others have lunch every day at the city-funded and -run seniors program at longtime rival church Our Lady of Pompeii on Bleecker Street. Some even partake in Pompeii’s bus trips to Atlantic City. The seniors see each other on their blocks, in their buildings and at the weekly 5 p.m. vigil mass on Saturdays. From September through May, on the first and third Thursday of the month, they meet up at the St. Anthony’s Seniors Club in the hall under the church.
A centerpiece event for the group, however, is the Feast of St. Anthony of Padua, celebrated on June 13. For St. Anthony’s on Sullivan Street, it marks the final day of a nine-day novena and the culmination of the celebration of the patron saint, which begins 13 Tuesdays earlier.

“For the nine days before the feast, there’s a flurry of activity,” continued Lorenzo. “The oil, the water, the medals imported from Italy, the bread.”

The seniors are right there on the front line, manning the church vestibule and taking donations for the blessed items. The same ladies work the same jobs every year: Millie and Helen do the oil and water, M.B. and Catharine do the bread and Ellie does the medals and prayer books.

“If you look at them now,” said Ciaravino, “as old as they are, they’re ready to help out and do anything they can for the parish.”
At one time, their feast day was commemorated with a week-long festival that rivaled San Gennaro. As the Italians moved out of the neighborhood and newcomers moved in, noise complaints shut the festival down. But the procession still takes place and draws a jam-packed, overflow crowd to the church.

For this year’s 62nd anniversary of the feast day and street procession, it’s estimated that over 1,200 people filled the church pews, spilling into the aisles and necessitating the opening of the balcony, which is normally closed. Afterward, the threat of rain that hovered for the better part of the day gave way to a golden sunset as the crowd took to the streets for the procession. Led by the statue, which was placed in the bed of a pick-up truck driven by Lorenzo, and an old-timey Italian band, the crowd followed the statue of St. Anthony from Sullivan Street to Bleecker, down to Broome and back up to the church.

As Dotty Zullo walks the procession route, she gives a bit of an historical tour from her perspective. “I grew up right there on the second floor…That place used to be a restaurant and, when he was a little boy, my son took a picture there with Marilyn Monroe. That place [The Dutch] used to be a club with pool tables. And that laundromat, that was Virginia’s, where we all got our sandwiches.”

At 84 years old, Zullo is still a looker. Her nails and hair are always done, and she hates to take a photo without lipstick. Taking pride in how she looks is one thing she attributes to her longevity. “I wouldn’t go out if I didn’t look right,” she said. “I think that’s a good attitude to have.”

“These are people who live a long time,” added Lorenzo. “They’re very, very active, and I think a lot of it has to do with living on third- and fourth-floor walk-ups. People you wouldn’t expect in their eighties and nineties are out every day.”

Marching through the streets of New York City following a life-sized saint statue pinned with dollar bills and a basketful of prayers feels like something out of The Godfather Part II. And it should, since a similar scene in the movie was filmed here. The day’s events are a throwback to a time when “Up on the Roof” was not just a song to these women but a way of life. They reminisce about going up to sunbathe, fly kites, eat macaroni and drink wine.

The procession concludes under a shower of confetti with the Red Mike Festival Band playing a rousing rendition of “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Downstairs in the hall, food and religious artifacts are for sale and Fazio and the seniors are there to take donations for small plastic bottles of holy water and St. Anthony’s oil. There’s still a lot of St. Anthony’s bread left over and, since it’s blessed, it must be eaten and not thrown away. “Eat this bread and you’ll never go hungry,” M.B. advised earlier in the week.

As the day draws to a close, there’s a sense this is a special scene, but not one that will be happening forever. “These women are very strong, physically and mentally,” said Lorenzo. “There is a deep history in each one of them and it’s not something you find out easily—sometimes it’s not until you hear a eulogy, and then you go ‘Wow!’”

Until then, they still have the seniors club and each other. When asked what she thinks of it, Ciotta replied, “I’m one of the lucky ones, I guess.”

By Regan Hofmann

In the ever-shifting neighborhood creep of Downtown, it seems nothing is what it’s supposed to be anymore. Little Italy has become Chinatown, Nolita has become Soho and Soho has become Times Square. Walking from block to block you’re not quite sure what you’re going to get—but you can be sure it’s not what you thought it was supposed to be.

Enter The Pan American at 202 Mott St., by all appearances a sleek, shiny restaurant of the New Nolita bent. There’s just enough signage on the all-glass front to make sure you know you’re in the right place, but not enough to be so outré as to advertise itself. A turquoise gleam emanates through the window, and a glance at the menu gives an impression of the sort of Nuevo Latino cooking that came up quickly a few years ago and is de rigeur for those model types who want to prove they eat food by nibbling at miniature empanadas.

But look again. On closer inspection, the menu reveals a curiously vegan streak, listing snacks such as carrot chicharron and kale chips. Then again, entrées include a plate that includes both skirt steak and oxtail, so it can’t be just a meat-free zone. Accompanying some dishes are health-food buzzwords like quinoa and kale, but you can also get fried chicken and taquitos, so it can’t be an ascetic bore. And peer through the door at the bar; tucked in with the shifting lights and gleaming white surfaces are a rainbow of jars and bottles, unlabeled, moonshine-like—housemade infusions and syrups that prove they won’t just give you a model-approved vodka soda.

There’s a point at which you have to let go and let god at The Pan American, when your instincts have been so thoroughly baffled that you find yourself willing to try anything. This is as it should be. When your server recommends a Rosey Palmer from the list of original cocktails, order it, even though it’s vodka-based and you prefer gin, even though you can’t stand sweet, fruity drinks and it comes in a pretty shade of pink. In fact, the tea-flavored vodka is balanced by the bracingly tart hibiscus (housemade, of course) and the result is compulsively drinkable.

Order those chicharrons, too, though you hate the idea of meat substitutes and would rather vegans stop trying to fool themselves. Don’t worry, here the word chicharron is used as a frame of reference more than a literal interpretation. Like their fried pig skin namesake, the sweet, smoky crisps make a perfect bar snack.

And don’t write off the more straightforward Latin American dishes, even if you catch a glimpse of the chef, looking straight off the Wisconsin dairy farm. His salsa verde, which accompanies the cheese-and-chile taquitos, reveals he’s no pretender; it’s bright and vegetal, with a citrus edge that hides a serious kick underneath.

Entrées are fully conceptualized plates with a number of components, at least one of which is invariably a curveball. Duck breast, seared to perfectly rendered skin and tender, medium-rare center, was served with collard greens and quinoa in a recognizably Native American bent—and then there was the pineapple gooseberry glaze.

This topsy-turvy ride closely mirrors the path of the restaurant’s chef, Harry Stoehr, who arrived in New York via the Midwest, a stint in Napa and a turn with Daniel Boulud. Like a true (adoptive) Californian, he wants to provide vegan and gluten-free food that doesn’t scare away everyone else—why not? He came up in working farms, so an affinity for his ingredients comes naturally. And years of cooking family meal in kitchens has him comfortable with the spectrum of Latin American flavors and traditions (rumor has it his tamales are better than most abuelas’.) Everything that can be made in house at The Pan American is, even some improbable ingredients like garlic powder and dulce de leche. You’d be worried he’s going to run himself ragged, if you weren’t so busy devouring everything he puts in front of you.

The next time you’re walking around the space between Houston and Canal, trying to sort out why the block with the Italian Christmas lights has three Chinese groceries and a designer eyewear boutique but no Italian restaurants, you’re in just the right frame of mind for The Pan American. Forget what you think you know is around the next corner—just dive in and go along for the ride.

Photo credit: A nuevo Latino eatery with vegan flair in Nolita.

Walking through the seemingly endless red-, white- and green-adorned crowd of purveyors, pedestrians and onlookers, it’s hard to picture the festival’s humble beginnings 85 years ago. But at the heart of the festivities are the religious origins of the event—a celebration of the patron saint of Naples by the Italian immigrants who settled the area. To that effect, the festival includes religious processions, a celebratory mass and religious ornaments strewn throughout. But whether you come for the religious aspect, the zeppoles or just for the experience, there’s something here for everyone.