As soon
as you go into the neighborhoods off of downtown Washington D.C. – or at least the
neighborhoods where I was – there’s just this overwhelming sameness, of row
houses intermittently broken with bland but expensive bars and chain stores.
Some of
the only life was 2 longtime (black) residents I met who were working in
service jobs in the city, one a hotdog vendor near the Smithsonian who I
chit-chatted with and who then gave me a free bag of chips after I realized I was
still hungry after eating the hotdog I had bought and getting back in line to
buy some chips, and the other a cashier at the FDR memorial souvenir store, who
helped me sort through gift possibilities for my mom, and then was telling me
about all the (white) yuppies buying up houses and building expensive stores in
his neighborhood where he grew up and still lives, and all the long-time
(black) residents just sitting on their porches and staring at these stores
they can’t afford to shop at and just hating them, but also selling out their
property when they get offers since the money is just too good to pass up.
“I
wouldn’t live anywhere else but D.C.,” the souvenir store cashier told me,
though he also said he has never travelled anywhere else and wouldn’t have any
money to do so till he finished school.
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