On the fourth of March at 10:45 am I was waiting for the Brighton Beach bound Q local train on Kings Highway station. The train arrived momentarily and as I boarded I contacted my group members. When I reached for my phone I saw that the screen was crammed with blue, green any gray bubbles of text messages that I hadn’t read. My group members were already at the location so I hurried as fast as I could and finally arrived at the predetermined location at 11:03 am. As I disembarked from the train a flash of bright light hit my face followed by a sharp piercing breeze every thing I looked at was covered in a thick film of soft white snow. The temperature oscillated between thirty and thirty-five degrees, providing an abrupt but bearable atmosphere for exploration during the majority of the expedition. I located Abraham, Mitch, Mark and Robin standing at the staircase exit and started towards them, upon which we headed down the greasy dim lit staircase to the streets down below. We were near Brighton beach which is located near the southern portion of Brooklyn it is also recognized as Little Odessa. This neighborhood was ripe with rich Russian culture; there were Russian shops, restaurants, stores, and stalls all lined up on the street. There were large trucks and many other vehicles rushing past us.

We began our first ethnographic survey at the berth of Brighton Beach. The whole beach was inconspicuous and undistinguishable because it was all vailed with the thick white snow. Only the the wooden board walk and the metal railing showed us that the beach was beyond their boundaries. As I gazed out to the ocean I noticed that the start of the beach was abruptly transformed from a light brownish yellow sand to a pure white field and the line between them was literally the sole distinguishing feature. We then went past the railing and onto the beach and as we strolled out to the vast sea five discrete pairs of tracks were embossed on the pure pearly beach giving us the sense that we were disturbing the cycle of nature; however,  We went on towards the water and were baffled to see the flocks of sea gulls swooping up and down the beach some were landing others taking off while others still walking on the beach or floating in the ocean but all of them were leaving or had left their tracks in the snow making a beautiful collage that was the the masterpiece of nature itself just as any other masterpiece that Michelanglo had painted.  When we finally reached the edge of the beach we saw waves upon waves cascading and racing against each other and desperately trying to reiterate themselves as far back on the shoreline as they could possibly stretch each time getting closer and closer just to quench their thirst for land while eating away at every inch of snow they could lay their hands on.

As we walked on the shoreline I saw beautiful sea shells (which unfortunately were the gruesomely devoured remains of clams, however, at the same time they represented the fact that they were essentially a part of the cycle of nature). We saw a man fully equipped with a scuba diving gear calmly diving in and out of the depths of the oceans in laps ranging approximately five hundred meters, horizontal to the shoreline. As we approached him to ask for an interview he went further out to seas simply waving to us and unintentionally wasting our efforts. We soon lost his site of him as we past a long jetty stretching out to the cosmic ocean. As we made our way back to the market are we were perplexed to see an old man running on the board walk practically naked (only wearing his boxers) in freezing temperatures.

A large segment of our survey involved sampling various Russian foods so we went to different areas following Mark as our guide. He lead us to a stand outside what seemed to be a Russian bakery and ordered an item that consisted of either meat, potato, or cabbage stuffed within fried dough. Despite its size the stall had small compartments separating many different products which surprisingly conceived quite a load of product within it. We then went into a Russian food mart there we bought a soft drink made of whortleberry, cranberries, blueberries, and kiwi. It was packaged in a rectangular container with Russian inscriptions all over it. There was a stand inside the mart that had numerous Russian salads and other dishes included turkey rolled into small balls, turkey hot dog pieces, and scallions; and a puff pastry-like cake called Napoleon. We bought a load of almost all products and headed to the sitting are on the beach there we rested and ate. After the constant struggle of finishing the food and battling the cold that penetrated through our clothes we decided to head back home and coincidently the snow was gradually decreasing and by the time we got to the train station it stopped altogether. At exactly 12:30 we were in the train that was taking us home.

On the15th of April 2016 we decided to go on our second ethnographic survey so we meet up at the same place at 11:00 am. It was a bright sunny day and the neighborhood seemed much more lively. As we made our way through to the beach we meat a group of people who were protesting against the corporate powers of Verizon. We decided to walk all the way to the end of the boardwalk of Brighton beach until we reached the cony island and the amusement park. On our we we saw numerous broken shells and a few dead horse shoe crabs. We found on that was barely alive and decided to help it to get back in the ocean but It was too late for it as a gull swooped down on it and started pecking. We then continued on and saw and a lot of people running and walking on the beach It was a totally different view this time around everything was clear unlike the fogy scenery we saw when we were there on the day it was snowing. Surprisingly we saw the same scuba diver and the same old man running on the beach. This suggested to us that maybe it was a daily routine for these people to come there.

When we finally reached the amusement park we realized that it was still closed however there were many people waling on the beach and boardwalk. There were two girls who were doing cartwheels, a man who was fishing using a fishing rod, people laying on the benches and some heading to the food stands/stores on the boardwalk which included ice cream stands, cotton candy, burgers, cold drinks and many more. We bought cotton candy and headed back to the place where we got the bread filled with potatoes, cabbage or meat and bought a few of breads to satisfy our hunger and we also conducted an interview of the lady who was selling them.  After which we walked to the train station and on our way we met a violinist who was performing he was 73 years old, wearing a suit and playing the violin on his shoulder. We asked him for an interview and inquired him about his experience in the Brighton beach community. He said that the people there were very nice and that he had been performing there for 17 years. After this interview we went to the train station and parted our ways to home.

~Asad