every august when the streets are fraught with sweaty men and ice cream stands a little 1/2 island from the carribbean celebrates being dominican, and being in new york city. last year i made the foolish choice to move most of my worldly belongings, once cart-load at a time, 4 blocks north up audubon to move into my current residence. this year i made the mistake of making plans with a friend 17 blocks south, still in washington heights, on the biggest dr day of the year.
for those of you that have visited me in my hood, or those of you that are actually from there, you know that a typical summer day includes scantily clad women with questionable fashion sense, families playing dominoes on the front stoop, and boys being trained at various ages that hissing at a woman is an invite to carnal pleasures not even they are yet aware of.
if you multiply this by 100, you get yesterday in washington heights.
although the parade is on 6th avenue downtown, post legitimate festivities are held uptown, the epicenter at which is located directly in front of my building, no joke.
a bit timid about shooting said festivities, i managed to get some shots in on my walk to the "other side of the tracks" and managed to capture a fraction of the good times had by all. i also learned that a woman with a camera in hand elicits many "take my picture" from the good, the bad and the ugly.
the results are below.
take a look...
august 2010
