For SEAS Class Day speaker engineering is the new liberal arts.

FaCU, SGB funding meetings should be open to all.

The New Harlem, its a happening place.

The mayor of Brigadoon bids farewell.

Gandhi scholar to hang it up after 40 years of teaching the same course.

Jeffrey Sachs goes back to the future.

It's a sad day for artists and art enthusiasts: Today marks the final day of existence for the Triple Candie Art Gallery on 126th. Triple Candie was once—and still is, until 5 PM today—home to some of Harlem's most promising young artists.

To commemorate its 7-year history, the gallery is featuring a retrospective of its life in the main show space.

No word yet on what will be moving into the Triple Candie's old home, but Bwog's bets are on a mediocre, over-priced Italian restaurant or perhaps some refurbished apartments.

In which Bwog correspondent Alex Weinberg survives to tell the tale.

A few weeks ago, I found a small postcard on 114th Street. It read "No Dew, Nor Rain / No Pain, No Gain: A Three Year Boycott of Harlem," and it explained that the Honorable James David Manning PhD, head of ATLAH World Missionary Church on 123rd Street, is calling for a boycott of his own neighborhood in order to save it from gentrification. Suffocating Harlem's businesses and forcing its people into homelessness will prevent it from being destroyed, according to a leap of logic that could only be advocated by a true man of God.

After perusing the website and watching some of his videos, I knew I had to witness the madness firsthand. Last Thursday night, I strolled to 123rd and Lenox for an open sermon about the boycott.

Let it be known that there is nothing like the sight of armed Black Panthers to remind you of your completely irrational fear of armed Black Panthers, several of whom had attended the event for the specific purposes of standing and looking angry. As I approached them, I imagined my poor Ma receiving my corpse in the mail. She would insist that I have a gravestone that reads "Alex Weinberg: shot in the mouth because he is a damn moron." There would be nobody to write this article, and there would be nobody to change my Facebook status to "dead."

In which Bwog freelancer Kate Linthicum discovers soul food that's actually good for your soul.

I've been a vegetarian since I was four, when my family's mischievous Labrador puppy attacked my pet hen. Her name was Pearl, and she was the softest, sweetest chicken in the whole world. I stopped eating meat the day I discovered her feathers strewn across the flowerbeds.

Morally, it was the right decision for me. Socially, it kind of sucked. Growing up, I always felt like an outsider at lunchtime, munching quietly on home-packed lunches of carrots and peanut butter sandwiches while the rest of the kids loaded up on chicken nuggets. I pretended to know why people went crazy for Happy Meals, sloppy joes and soul food, but I just couldn't relate.

But then I dined at Uptown Juice Bar, a little Harlem gem that specializes in vegetarian Caribbean fare. It's one of the only restaurants in New York that serves soul food that's actually good for your soul.

Since 1995 the Juice Bar has occupied a narrow storefront on 125^th street between Lennox and Fifth Avenue. It's about a half hour walk from Columbia's campus. The restaurant is nestled next to a store that sells specialty wigs, and outside men with long dreads hawk reggae cds.

At 2:00 AM last night, I set my alarm clock to wake me up at the obscene hour of 7:30 AM. The next morning, I was going to church. Specifically, I had two churches in mind. The first is the most famous church in Harlem, the Abyssinian Church on West 138th Street, and the second, Mother African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, was the first black church in the area and is only one block down from the former.

Under the impression that services started at 10 AM, I left around 9 AM and got to 137^th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Blvd an hour later. There was a huge line outside of what seemed to be an abandoned building, which was ostensibly the line to get into the Abyssinian.

Mimicking an elderly woman I had just seen walk in, I tried entering one of the red front doors. But the man who was standing idly in front of the door was actually something of a church-bouncer. As I walked by, he cleared his throat loudly. I pretended not to notice and kept walking. Apparently I didn't look like a regular. "Excuse me," he interrupted. "You need to wait with all the others, down the block.
It was only 10 AM, and the line already seemed too long. Most of the people waiting looked like tourists or area-hipsters searching for soul.

October 2, 2007 @ 1:10 PM | 1 comments | Post a comment | | | Email this post | Share on Facebook

May 29, 2007 @ 2:09 AM | 12 comments | Post a comment | | | Email this post | Share on Facebook

April 24, 2007 @ 5:22 PM | 26 comments | Post a comment | | | Email this post | Share on Facebook

April 24, 2007 @ 11:02 AM | 11 comments | Post a comment | | | Email this post | Share on Facebook

October 17, 2006 @ 3:43 PM | 4 comments | Post a comment | | | Email this post | Share on Facebook

The following is a departure from typical Bwog style. But Bwog staffer Lydia DePillis couldn't help bringing it to your attention anyway, and hopes you'll bear with something that's more sweetness than snark.

Just across Morningside Park, another school is gearing up for the start of classes on Tuesday. Teachers at P.S. 180 spend long hours in their rooms to ready them for students, organizing folders and art supplies while the long hallways are waxed and buffed. But while they refer to Columbia with a vague gesture upwards, college is anything but remote for these youngsters: everything they do is oriented towards higher education, a big leap for many in a neighborhood where even a high school diploma is an accomplishment.

When the 400 students walk through the doors next week —all drawn from a four-block radius, and only one of them white—they'll see flags of elite schools crowding the polished lobby walls. The 5th grade class will take a trip to some college or university. Brand new Apple desktops furnish the rooms, and every teacher will receive a palm pilot this year to keep track of assignments. This, in a school where in 1999 not one student passed the standardized reading test—since then, scores have risen dramatically, an improvement that many credit to the school's dynamic principal.

P.S. 180 does get help from Teachers College students, but 2nd grade teacher Julie Shapiro (pictured taking a break from room prep) still needs field trip chaperones and reading tutors. If you'd like to help, go here. Bwog can't imagine a better way to forget about a nasty problem set than helping a kid with theirs.

September 3, 2006 @ 6:32 PM | 6 comments | Post a comment | | | Email this post | Share on Facebook

Every night you spend drunk at the Abbey causes the same existential crisis: lazy as you are, you really do need to get out of Morningside Heights. Now the Blue and White offers you a no muss, no fuss approach. A four stop, weekly walking tour. Print, follow, see a little, and come back to Carman feeling like you've accomplished something—then head to the West End. After all, you deserve a celebration.

In honor of how few Columbians have actually walked past Teachers College, we bring you a chance to bound through the streets of our northern neighbor's neighborhood. Inspired by the Autobiography of Malcolm X, this tour takes you to some of the less known but more interesting sites in West Harlem. None of these sites are found on any tourist maps, and we like it that way. Stop where we tell you, take a look around. It'll be more fun then getting brunch at Deluxe again, we swear.

(Read more...)

February 2, 2006 @ 7:09 PM | 0 comments | Post a comment | | | Email this post | Share on Facebook