Ethnic Landscapes

So this blog is kind of cool.  Ethnic landscapes.  So much of the world we live in is centered around some sort of ethnic landscape.  Here in Buffalo, for about ten years, I lived in North Buffalo.  This is an area that, over the years has been predominately both Italian and Jewish.  Now, I have a bit of a biased opinion of this type of portrayal.  First and foremost, in my mind, saying that an area is "Jewish" does not really say anything in my mind.  Judaism is a religion and not an ethnic background in my mind.  This is because there are so many different backgrounds that Jews come from.  For example, a Jewish neighborhood in New York City will look, act and be very different than a Jewish neighborhood in Warsaw, Poland.

Keeping this in mind, as well as my understanding of the assignment, I will not talk further about this.

I do feel that different backgrounds of people can greatly affect the landscape around these people.  Back to North Buffalo.  I will admit that I do know a large number of Jews that either grew up in North Buffalo or have many different stories of North Buffalo, my parents, aunts and uncles included.  There are many different synagogues, both past and present, that do/have resided there.  Off the top of my head, I can think of three within about a four block radius.  One on Tacoma just west of Colvin, one on Saranac just north of Hertel and one right on Hertel by the corner of Traymore.  Without using Mapquest, I can say that all three of these locations are probably within a 3/4 mile radius.  This is one piece of evidence that, formerly, there were a very large number of Jews living in this area.  Another piece of evidence that I found are mezuzahs.   A mezuzah is a little scroll that Jews would place, historically on every door frame of their house.  It was also a prayer to bless everybody that came through the doors of the house.  While I lived in North Buffalo For almost twelve years, only two of those years was in a house without a mezuzah.  For ten years (all in one apartment) I did notice that someone had taken the time to place mezuzahs on all the door frames of the  apartment.  Although they had been painted over, I knew for sure what they were.  I also have many stories within my family of my aunts and uncles going to the local high school, Bennett High.  This is where my mom's older brother met his soon-to-be wife, my aunt.

Another characteristic of this being a Jewish neighborhood was Mastman's Kosher Deli.  On the corner of Colvin and Hertel stands a builing that still has the Mastman's sign hanging right on the corner.  It looks somewhat older, however I have many fond memories of this deli of m own.  I grew up eating what Mastman's was known for, their kosher corned beef.  What a wonderful stereotype, Jews and their corned beef!!!!  I remember going there as a child with my parents.  It was not a beautiful looking place and I probably didn't think much of it.  It was where we went for corned beef as well as a few other things, usually at least once a year for some sort of holiday.  I think, as I have grown up, maybe it was for the corned beef, but may be it wasn't.  My father grew up with the owner, Jack, they were in Boy Scouts together growing up, and both of them were modest about it.  My father never implied that we would be going there because he know the owner, it was always about the food.  When we would go there they would say hi to each other and take a few minutes to catch up, and then it was down to the food.  I do remember this as the only place that I knew of where they would serve a cup a soup in styrofoam with a plastic spoon where, if you left the spoon in the soup too long, it would melt.  Now that's a HOT cup of soup!!!!  My other very fond memories of the joint revolve around my grandfather.  As he was getting up in years, my mom's father still liked to go to "the old haunts" for a sandwich for lunch.  By now, he was in his eighties,  couldn't see anymore due to macular degeneration and didn't drive.  His best friend from when he was growing up, who couldn't walk and had an assistant, would take my grandfather to Mastman's.  Unfortunately, I didn't meet them there enough.  The servers new them by name and order and were always happy to see the two of them, no matter what.

Often times I can recall driving down Hertel with either my grandparents or my own parents and having them show me where everything used to be, the kosher butcher, the movie theatre, the newsstand, the bowling alley, everything.  It really made me feel very comfortable when I moved into the area, first with my brother who I shared a flat with, and then my soon-to-be wife who I also shared a different flat with.

As for why such a large number of Jews moved into this area over the years, I don't know.  But the evidence is still there.  Like so many ethnicities, the religion of Judaism is and will always be a close knit community.  I'm sure some still think "strength in numbers" or "to be with others in a similar situation as ourselves" is the reason.  Maybe so, I'm not sure, but I do know that, if you look around any city, you can find a number of different neighborhoods with different ethnic backgrounds, offering all sorts of "tastes of home" that others may feel are very weird or different or even gross.  I must say, I welcome the "weirdness"  of others.  I feel I have a lot to learn from others with different backgrounds and welcome the differences with open arms.  Without open arms I feel we can only hurt and alienate ourselves from the rest of the world.  Think about it, we weren't called the melting pot for nothing......