Tuesday, June 3, 2008

East Flatbush




East Flatbush
East Flatbush is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The exact borders of it are up for debate, however there are some that most people agree on. The northern border is roughly at Empire Boulevard and East New York Avenue east of East 91st Street, the southern border is in the vicinity of the LIRR Bay Ridge Branch, the eastern border is roughly at East 98th Street and the western border is roughly at New York Avenue.




The dictionary defines "the hood" as a poor area or estate within a city or town, associated with gangs and crime. Term seems to stem from African-American slang although it has crossed over into mainstream language through the media. However to me the hood is the place where i grew up and still reside. "The hood " does get a lot of negative connotations from people and the media, but there are many aspects of the "hood life" that are positive.

I live in East Flatbush, and I love the place that I live in. There are some aspects of it that can be called negative, however there are also many positive aspects of my neighborhood. The people in my neighborhood are all caught in a struggle for survival. The poverty level for this area is 16%. So in this neighborhood people do feel the need to fight for and to protect what they feel is theirs. Another negative aspect of this neighborhood or any hood for that matter is the fact that people get bored easily and can do random things for fun. For example one summer my cousin and I were outside hanging out when we were approached by a group of five girls. They then started to press my cousin telling her that they wanted to fight her. My cousin and I had never seen these girls before in our lives. However there was no talking out of this situation, so my cousin and I fought the girls, and since there were more of them, they obviously had the upper hand and ended up winning the fight. If the people in our area had more things to do, I think that there would be less problems like this in the area. However the problem will never be fixed fully unless the poverty in the area is gone.
Even though there are those negative aspects, there are many positive aspects also. The people in the area can be very kind and sharing towads you if you can make the connection to them. If you make friends with someone, it can be almost guaranteed that they will have your back for life. The families also like to bring their kids up together, so you know that someone will always be there for you if something happens. Another positive thing about East Flatbush is that there are a lot of good restaurants in the area that sells food that comes from a country where you might be from, for example Jamaica or India. East Flatbush has a large West Indian population so I feel that it has more culture than other areas. Even though people may say this neighborhood is bad I feel that it is a great place to grow up because it can teach you lessons for later on in life, like knowing how to take care of yourself so none can make a fool of you. I love my hood, and I dont regret growing up or living here.

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