I’m going to start off by saying that I don’t usually completely agree or disagree with something. However, in the case of ‘Here is New York’ I was able to agree with most of what White said. There were five main points in the writing that I agreed with and they are the division of New York, the analogy of New York as a poem, calling New york a city within a city, the difficulty of how New York functions and the fact that it was called the capital of the world.

The first thing mentioned that I agree with is the division of New York amongst the different kind of ‘New Yorkers’. But, I wouldn’t exactly use the same words that were used in the passage. The passage said, “There are roughly three New Yorks.” (Page 25) Rather, I would’ve said that there are three different perspectives by which New York is seen in the eyes of its inhabitants. I agree with the way he describes the distinctions though, that there is the native who basically grew up with New York so they feel it will be omnipresent. Then there is the commuter who was described as locust which is a good metaphor because they use the resources of the city and leave. Lastly, the third type of New Yorker is one that is described of coming as if out of a greater calling or following their heart and these descriptions although sounded a little cliche really fit the stereotype of New York.

One other part of the passage which really stuck out to me was on page 31 where it pretty much said that it is a wonder that New York functions at all. The example given by the passage was that, “Every time the residents brush their teeth millions of gallons of water must be drawn from the Catskills and the hills of Westchester.” I feel the reason this stuck out to me so much is because I don’t think I ever truly thought about how much water is being used in one moment at New York and it was astounding to me to actually picture millions of people trying to draw water all at the same time. When I actually pictured it I realized the truth behind the passage and how difficult it actually it is for the city to function.

Furthermore I agree with the part of the passage that called New York a city within a city and neighborhoods within neighborhoods. In fact I feel like this also ties into what was mentioned earlier about New York being a type of poem where life is compressed into one small Island. Back to the neighborhood point however, although life in New York is not like life in rural areas where one speaks to their neighbors in an ‘over the fence’ type manner neighbors are different where the whole building is your neighbor and even the people you go see on your way to work also become your neighbors. The example given in the passage was his friend moved two blocks away from her “old neighborhood” (two blocks away) and her grocer was happy she still went to that grocery shop. Similarly a friendly neighbor would be happy to their old neighbor who had just moved away.

Lastly, my favorite point brought up in the passage was how New York is on way of “becoming the capital of the world”. I don’t just agree to this statement because I’m from New York. I also agree because of the attributes New York has. One important attribute New York has is the money. New York is a city where a lot of money is handled at all times of the day given places like Wall Street/the New York Stock Exchange. Furthermore, another way New York is becoming capital of the world is because of the reason given in the passage, in other words the UN. New York hosts the United Nations which hosts diplomats from all if not most of the countries in the world, which shows it has significance in the Global scale and not just the United States.

So, although I don’t always fully agree with passages, in this case I truly have to say that I agree with most of the points in the passage and it was very well written and presented.