I highly recommend going grocery shopping with eight friends at once. It turns a lonely, annoying errand into a magical romp. You get inspired to buy new things while keeping the hang going. It’s even better if you pair it with food beforehand, so you’re all too full to go overboard at the store afterwards. We started with dim sum at East Harbor Seafood Palace, a massive banquet hall in Sunset Park. We caught the tail end of the steamer carts by 2PM but still ate all the dumplings, buns and rolls we could flag down.
Afterwards, we meandered over to Fei Long Market, where you handpick any live fish or seafood before it is expertly gutted and cleaned in front of you. We roamed every single aisle and now our kitchen is stocked with pomelos, ramen noodles and industrial-sized jars of the best chili crisp.
Sky High Farms has launched their new grant cycle! If you have a project in agriculture, food justice, and/or land sovereignty that needs funds, applications are open through April 15.
I love reading anything
writes but his latest installment of is particularly excellent. It’s a beautiful tribute to the rich history of Black fashion designers.Neal Agarwal made a website that lets you wander through the weirdest wonders of Google Street View. Just keep hitting the big “random” button and you too many encounter a statue of a quarter-pounder, a park filled with dinosaur sculptures or this person below.
His other website lets you scroll down into the depths of the sea. I am reminded that we still don’t have a movie about the deepest trip to the ocean. The 1960 expedition by Swiss oceanographer Jacques Piccard and his American co-adventurer Don Walsh to the Mariana Trench in the Pacific was nine years before the moon landing, and we’ve had countless space stories since then. The two still hold the record over sixty years later for the plunge to the deepest point on Earth.
The Maratha Mandir cinema in Mumbai has played the same movie every day since it premiered 27 years ago. I am now dying to watch “Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge” — or “The Big-Hearted Will Take the Bride.” Cinema lives!
Fiona Apple has now become a court watcher. She’s been volunteering with Court Watch PG, a huge virtual court-watching organization that is showing people how to bear witness and call out injustice. It was started by Qiana Johnson who, after being incarcerated for two years, became the only court watcher in Prince George’s County, Maryland.
During the pandemic, hearings could suddenly be attended virtually, making them far more accessible. In the last three years Johnson has been able to grow her organization into the largest virtual court watch program in the country and they’re always looking for more helpers.
My year of dicks is a winner.
The world is small, but the planet is vast and unknowable. Writer
(who is behind the great ) and her wife, the illustrator Debbie Millman took turns recounting their trip to Antartica. I was delighted by their romantic adventure to see a total eclipse of the sun.The most harrowing piece I read this week was sent to me via Gianna about the shadow economy of migrant child labor. It’s a damning report — journalist Hannah Dreier spoke to over 100 migrant child workers in 20 states and names names. “In Los Angeles, children stitch ‘Made in America’ tags into J. Crew shirts. They bake dinner rolls sold at Walmart and Target, process milk used in Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and help debone chicken sold at Whole Foods.”
It’s an unflinching exposé and in response, the Biden administration announced it will be creating a new task force to combat child labor exploitation. But in a country where family separation is at the core of immigration policy, the resulting outcome will always be children falling through the cracks.
Rent parties started in the 1910s as Black tenants faced discriminatory landlords who doubled and tripled rates in Harlem. Hosts would open up their apartments for the night to throw a dance party with live music and refreshments. The admission charge would go towards making the rent and the parties were always held on Saturday since it was pay day.
The Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance writes that “as many as twelve parties in a single block and five in an apartment building, simultaneously, were not uncommon.” Mutual aid at its finest.
Till next time,
ASK