Straight Talk

The Manhattan skyline looks different from the other side of the East River — and once you've had coffee on a Long Island City rooftop watching the sun hit the Chrys

There's a moment — usually somewhere around 181st Street, stepping out of the A train into the open air — when you realize Washington Heights isn't like the

There's a park at the top of a cliff in Washington Heights where kids can watch the George Washington Bridge traffic hum below while they eat a mango from a street cart on Dyckman Street.

There's a moment on Smith Street, maybe around Carroll Street, where you realize you're not in a tourist neighborhood anymore. The guy ahead of you in

The first thing you notice walking up St. Nicholas Avenue past 140th Street is how much room there is. Wide sidewalks, prewar brownstones with actual stoops, kids on bikes

There's a particular Saturday morning feeling in Bed-Stuy that you can't manufacture: the smell of jerk chicken drifting from somewhere on Fulton Street before noon, old-t

There's a moment on a Saturday morning in Harlem when the smell of fresh waffles drifts out of a storefront on 125th Street, kids are already chasing p

There's a moment that happens on Orchard Street around 7pm on a Saturday — the vintage shops are pulling their racks inside, the smell of something

The mural on the corner of 181st and St. Nicholas stops you cold — a massive, full-building tribute to Dominican culture that no tour bus will ever tak

The smell of brisket still drifts out of Katz's Delicatessen on Houston Street at 11pm on a Saturday, mixing with bass from the clubs two blocks

The little league game at Highbridge Park wraps up, your kids are covered in dirt, and someone's already asking where to eat. That's Washington Heights doing

The smell of smoke from Dinosaur Bar-B-Que drifting down 125th Street on a Saturday afternoon tells you everything you need to know about Harlem.