I'm almost there...

We did peer editing yesterday and I feel like I got some really good comments on my paper. It gave me a more ideas for making my paper better and changing it to make more sense. I have to really put a lot of work into my final copy of the final paper!

Tomorrow is our last day of class. It seems like this semester flew by. I'm glad that we can finally be done with our blogging! It is so hard to remember to do it every week.

Second Draft

Our second draft is due tomorrow and I just finished reworking it for the peer editing. I'm really glad that class time is set aside for our peers to edit our papers because it gives me good ideas and they really put a lot into editing my papers! Yay. Even though I just finished my second draft, I know that I still have a lot of work to do on this paper to make it a wonderful FINAL PAPER! Like I said before.. this paper is going to push me to get a better grade if I do good on it!! I like my topic and I have a vested interest in it, so hopefully I can show that throughout my paper!

The Last Week!

This is my last week of my first year of college. :] It sure has been a journey. I am hoping that I can finish out this semester in a good way. I have a lot of studying and paper writing to do still & I'm hoping that everything turns out in a positive way. I have to work on my second draft of our final paper still. I have my sociology final next Monday and my math final due next Tuesday, along with our final paper being due on that day. This week and next weekend, I am dedicating to school & ONLY school. I just can't wait for next Tuesday to be over!! :]

FINALLY!

I finally presented my photo essay today and received my self reflection back. I thought that I would never get a chance to present since class is over in a week. I did though, and I did well on it too! Thank goodness! I'm glad that I've improved as the semester has gone on. Not once have I gotten a worse grade than the paper before. It makes me feel accomplished when I improve on every paper. I really like writing and I would really like to be a journalist but I know that I'm not THAT good. Oh well, I'll just stick with marketing or something like that!

Peer Editing

Even though I thought that my first rough draft was good, I realized that I still have a lot of work to do on it. After reading of it and reading the comments left by my peers I thought about a lot of new things that I should do to rework the paper. I need to put more of my opinion into the paper and put more feeling into it. I know that I can make my paper much better. Our second rough draft is due a week from today so I should get working on that so I can make it much better than this copy.

First Draft

Our first draft of our final paper is due tomorrow. I have completed it and I feel that I have a good thesis and that it is going in the right direction. Of course I have a ton of work to put into it still, but I hope that it will eventually turn out really good. This paper is kind of a make or break for my grade so I need to push myself to continue to edit and rework it to make it GREAT! :]

Greek Week

Greek week starts on Monday. No matter what happens, I know that my sisters will always be there for me! I'm pretty excited though. It should be really fun. I've heard how close it brings everyone together. I haven't been that close with everyone, so this should be good for us. I'm competing in a few events so hopefully I will do good for my sorority! :]

EEK!

I feel like I'm never home anymore. It is really hard to get everything done that I need to when I am barely home. Although I'm not home much, I am still doing okay in my classes. I am pushing myself to do the best I can do because I know how important it is to do good in my classes right now. I am hoping that the semester still turns out alright. I know I have a couple weeks still, but I'm starting to freak out about finals. I should probably start organizing everything and start studying so that I don't have to cram at the last minute!

*Second Blog Draft*

For this paper, I am writing about the Northville School district and the problems with the boundaries. I am hoping to make my thesis... The Northville School district has many problems with the way they distribute students to the different elementary and middle schools. I have to work on that and put it into my paper better but hopefully it will all come together good.

As for my sources.. I plan to interview a few different parents around the area on their opinions on the change in boundaries. I was thinking about possibly interviewing some of the middle school kids that the boundary change affects. Then I plan on using the school district websites. Hopefully if I can get to someone, I would like to interview someone at the school board office, although they are probably dealing with a lot of questions right now. I have to figure out what kind of books I am going to be able to use & some more credible on-line sources!

Real Estate

On occasion that I have driven through neighborhoods other than my own, I have found that many of the older neighborhoods have many homes for sale. Since I live in a brand new subdivision, I see the number of lots being sold and homes being built on the land. It seems that many older homes stay for sale for long periods of time while the new homes are being built like crazy. As I drove through the older subdivision I found numerous houses for sale within a couple blocks of each other.

Not only did this house have a for sale sign, the owners decided to rent the home as well.

The house that this for sale sign is located at has been for sale for about a year.

Two houses next to each other were both for sale.

An indoor pool at this house has not helped with selling the actual home.

Although hard to see, there are three for sale signs on one block at which none of the homes have been sold yet.

The beautiful model home leads people to want to purchase a home in this subdivision.

Five houses are currently under construction on this street.

Even some of the newer homes are for sale. Makes me wonder if the owners are moving on to even bigger and better homes.

As the sign says, new home sites continue to be released since so many people are so interested in building new homes.

Final Paper times 2!

While we were sitting in class today I was listening to what everyone had to say about their final paper. I got to thinking about what my topic and if it was really good. Then I remembered something big that has actually been going on in my city lately (Northville). My parents and the people that I babysit for have been talking about the re-zoning of the elementary and middle schools. I guess new boundaries have been drawn up and children have been switched to different schools, in some cases schools farther away from their homes.

This change affects me in a few ways. Although I did not attend Northville Schools and I am no longer in the K-12 grades, I have sisters and kids I babysit who are. The kids I babysit for have to change schools while all of their friends they have only known are staying at the same school. On the other hand, my sisters are all going to a school about fifteen minutes away from our house, while there is an elementary school one minute from our house. It seems like the re-zoning did not work out how it should have. Rather, the boundaries are a little messed up!

This topic seems to be very interesting. I know there are a lot of people bothered by this change and it would be worthwhile to put their thoughts into this paper. I feel a lot more strongly about this topic rather than the first one I picked. Hopefully my intuition was right and will help me to succeed on this paper! I have a lot of research and background to find about this topic and why the change had to occur in the first place. I have a feeling that the change occurred due to my first topic, because there are so many new homes being built in Northville. Maybe I could put the two topics together, or just stick with the Northville School zoning.

Final Paper

For our final paper in Composition 106 I have decided to write about the housing market in Michigan. About a year ago, my family put our house up for sale and all I heard about every day was how hard it was to sell homes at that time. Little did I know that the problems are still occurring. The housing market in Michigan may be a problem to those people who desperately need the money from selling their home.

It seems that part of the problem with selling homes has to do with the fact that many new subdivisions have gone up recently. It seems that although people are selling their homes they are not buying other people's homes, instead they are building their own home. My family decided to build a new home and in the time we have lived in our subdivision, many new families have decided to do the same thing.

It seems that the housing market is a problem for many different people throughout Michigan. This problem seems to cause people many problems. It would be interesting to find the source of these problems. Finding out more about this topic may be exciting and interesting. I plan to interview a real estate agent and I am sure that I will be able to find plenty of information online and hopefully in books!

Schooooool

School has been pretty stressful lately. Since the end of the semester is coming to a close soon, teachers sure are making the most of it. Being in apart of an organization at school has put the toll on me as well, since there is always something to do for it. I enjoy being busy, it helps to make sure things get accomplished but at the same time, it feels like there is not time to sit down and relax, I am always on the run! Soon enough though, it will be summer and it'll be time for more classes! Haha! Oh well, the more classes I get accomplished now, the less amount of school I have to go through! I just have to buckle down and get everything done as early as possible so I am not stressed out at the last minute!

Fixing My Photo Essay

I think I might but a little bit of a different spin on my photo essay. I will be keeping some of the pictures that I have already taken but add to them. I think it would be interesting to show the number of new homes being built compared to the number of older homes for sale, which are not selling right now. I think this is a problem and if it continues it seems like all of the older homes would need to be torn down to accommodate for land to build newer homes. I could use this topic for my final paper as well. I think that I will have an easier time & have my photo essay turn out better while taking these pictures and putting it together!

I also got some great suggestions from my classmates. I need to take into account what they had to say about my blog and make it much better. I hope that this will help me out in the end with the final copy of it.

Hopefully everything will work out great with this photo essay!!

Photo Essay Rough Draft

New construction causes many trees to be torn down and leaves open areas for months at a time.







Looking into my backyard, a large area of trees can be seen which were before part of a larger forest.











Numerous homes are being sold which causes more trees to be torn down due to the desire of new homes.











Perfect lines were made to make the property lines when the trees were cut down.

















Small sections of trees were left inbetween neighborhoods.












A small section of trees was left inbetween a house and an empty lot.














Large lots sit for months at a time without trees on them.














More open spaces sit in developing neighborhoods.

Graffiti Throughout Detroit

Graffiti takes all different forms. It can be about an issue someone is concerned with or about a person they disagree with or even just someone's tag. People like to put their feeling into the things they do but it might not always be the best idea. Sometimes graffiti is inappropriate for everyone to see and it might not be necessary for everyone either.

This picture clearly written "METH" is talking about a drug.
I don't think that it is necessary for someone to write about a drug on a wall of a building. What is the point of that? What good is it doing the community? It isn't doing the community any good, it is just letting people see this and read the word. For people that do not know about drugs, they may become aware of it through this. They could go home and look this up on the internet and gain information that they didn't necessarily need to know.



In this picture, it looks as though this might have once been or could possibly still be a train station or just the tracks for the train. When the train goes by this wall the people aboard see all of this graffiti all over the walls which may turn them off about the area they are entering. They may think that there are people who don't like the neighborhood enough to keep it nice. The trash all over the ground kind of adds to the bad look of the area.

Picture Essay

I recently moved to a new neighborhood. New houses are still being built in our neighborhood all around my house. There are other neighborhoods around me as well that are growing larger. A strip mall is being built close to my house as well. Pretty much, my area is growing and the new additions of buildings are helping with this change. I was thinking that I would use this as my topic for the paper. I thought it would be interesting to take pictures of the construction throughout my neighborhood and possibly other neighborhoods as well. It seems like it would be interesting. I hope it is would be good enough!!

Graffiti

In the article, Graffiti, the author describes a tunnel in which he or she enjoyed running through as a child. This tunnel had all different kinds of graffiti inside it, ranging from so & so loves so & so, to hateful things. Graffiti can be found all over big cities & little cities. Driving through the big cities, graffiti can be found on buildings or in alleys. When driving on the freeway I have often seen graffiti on bridges. Most of this graffiti is about so & so loving each other.

I find graffiti intriguing. It must take a lot of skill to be able to create such original pieces of work. Although graffiti is illegal, I think that the people who have made the art needs to be encouraged to find other ways to display their talent. It may be better for them to have a designated area, such as a building created for inside graffiti, and that way they are not defacing the buildings around the area.

As stated in the article, some people may use graffiti as a way to express how they feel about a subject. There are often pieces of graffiti pointing one someones hatred toward a specific topic, such as Jews in the article. The author of the graffiti wanted to let people know how he or she feels about the topic of Jews.

Yes, graffiti exists, and I don't think that it will ever go away. People use it as a way to express themselves and it may help some people with pain they are suffering from. Detroit has graffiti, as do mostly every big city in the country and possibly the world.

Xochimilco

In writing my final copy of the restaurant review, I feel that I have made some very good progress from the beginning when I started with my rough draft. I like the topic of this paper and it was very exciting to go to the restaurant and "review" it. I had been to Xochimilco about two years ago and it was fun to go back because I knew that it was the restaurant I wanted to write about. It has a good atmosphere and very good food. I will be going back to the restaurant sometime in the future to enjoy the food. I should get back to finishing my paper now. =] !!

too much publicity?

I am not sure if the attention that murder cases is good or not. It kind of seems like there is so much drama with everything, especially this Tara Grant case. It is important for people to know about the things happening in their area, but to know every detail? Is it really that important? I am not sure, I am not the one writing the article and usually not the one reading the articles either. I know that people find it interesting and look forward to reading the newest drama happening in their area, but to invade someones privacy and gossip about what has happened, it hurts people. Those members of the families involved in the cases may turn their computer on and see an article about that person and it may not be the most appropriate thing for them to read while grieving. I think that news writers need to watch how they portray the information they have received. I don't think it is necessary to have every single detail put on the Internet and broad casted to the entire world. It may be important to tell some facts of the case but things need to be held back.

1. What local issues are getting the most coverage?

It looks like some of the local coverage is still on the Tara Grant case. There was another incident I heard of on the radio today that is mentioned but doesn't seem to be as important as other issues. There was a girl shot outside of her Midland school and then the killer killed himself. It seems that there is always some sort of violence in the news. It seems like it is always possible to find an article about death or murder. There are always issues with the community discussed in the local issues, such as the school board or problems with roads or technology or a building that is under construction// needs to be removed. There seems to be some talk about proposal 2, which removed the chance of using race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin in work, and schools. This proposal passed in the election in November, but it being brought up right now.


2. What stands out to you about the coverage on freep.com? What concerns do they emphasize/de-emphasize? The "human factor"? The "drama factor"? Just the facts? What?

The coverage on freep.com is always very in depth about the event or the issue at hand. They seem to give every detail and fact that is known away to the readers. Sometimes it is not good for everyone to know the issues at hand before actually needed to know. There are sometimes leaks that occur which allow members of the community to know about things that could cause the people involved pain. At the same time... it makes for interesting reading to know every detail of something occuring in the area. It helps to understand how people felt, what exactly has taken place and why it has occured. Concerning the "human factor", yes people may be hurt by something that is said in a news report. I think that writers should try attempt some sort of quiet-ness when writing their articles so they do not ruin the event that has taken place. It seems that when something really big happens in our area or even our country, it gets news attention for a very long time. There always seems to be a new twist or a new issues brought up by the event. Even if an "issue" is important and people need to know about it, if something else big happens, the original issue seems to kind of disappear. People focus on the newest big issue instead of something that may have been important to them or affect them.


3. What's going on in your own backyard? What do you think?

I recently moved from Plymouth but when I select Northville, it is combined with Plymouth and Canton, which are close enough to count as my area. There isn't much going on in that area. Pretty much all of the articles listed are from the Plymouth-Canton area. It would be interesting to find out more about the Northville area, especially since I don't know very much about it in the first place. There are a lot of articles about the sports and marching band (which are very good). I guess if there isn't anything bad going on in the area, then it's a good thing and it should be kept that way. There is also talk about the Penn Theater, a landmark in downtown Plymouth. I thought it was funny when I looked for the local news I saw an article title "pet of the week". That is an interesting thing for newspapers to research about.


4. What might you want to research/ write about? Why?

I actually have no idea what I would want to research. It might actually be interesting to research a case such as the Tara Grant case. I find big cases to be interesting and since it is important in the news then it might be an easy research. It might also be interesting to research a certain place or event that has taken place. I need to put more thought into the subject and assignment to know for sure what I would like to do.

News

It just seems that everything in the news is negative, like everything worthwhile to write about has to be about something bad that has happened. The article about the final moments of Tara's life seemed very upsetting and made me become pretty upset. A lot of the articles are about violence and killing which may be important news to hear about but it is not always the easiest to read. Three of the five most popular articles that are listed about about the Tara Grant case, which shows how much attention the case is really getting. Another one of the popular articles involves the removal of Comerica in Michigan which could be detrimental for jobs in Michigan. Sports are always greatly looked upon in the news, most people will go to the news to see what the final score of their favorite game was if they missed it. Most games are covered very thoroughly. The news often has a wide variety of articles along with some topics over written about.

Restaurant Review

When given the assignment of reviewing a restaurant I felt that it is a good idea. I am excited to choose what restaurant I want to review and begin the process of evaluating it. I am a little worried about the time crunch since I will be gone for 10 days of spring break. I have to get to work and not waste time. Hopefully the end result is good!

Argentina Review

The author of this review seemed to do a very good job with the way she presented the information.
- Gave some history about the restaurant
- Listed other things that the owner is apart of, such as tango lessons
- Talked about some improvements that have occurred throughout the weeks
- Explained what is good to order and how it is made
- Gave very good descriptions and clean picture of how the food is
- Gave some of her opinions of how the restaurant could be made better
- Let reader know that the restaurant is open 7 days a week & is non smoking

Through reading this review I received a good picture of what my review should should like when completed. I need to make sure that I give the reader of my review a clear picture of what the food tastes like, what the restaurant looks like and how the experience was all together.

Profile Paper

I feel that I have a lot of work to do to make my paper better. Through interviewing Coach Baechler, I got a good impression of the kind of person he is and the accomplishments he has made. It is important that I put those things into the paper. I need to find a better way to put his voice into the paper. Explaining the way he looks and the way he talks will make the reader understand this man much better. I need to explain the things that make other people look up to him and appreciate what he has done for the community. I know that there are many people out there that feel he has done amazing things for his football team and those people need to be represented in this paper. Through editing my own paper, I have found that there are way too many being verbs and I know that I can make it much better if I eliminate those verbs. I also need to add more of Coach Baechler's voice into the paper. He is a stern, quiet man and the reader would not get that by just reading my rough draft. I have a lot of work to do with citations as well throughout this paper. All together, I have a lot of work, but I'm sure it will all come together. :]

Rap on Rap

I find it interesting that in this article, Rap on Rap: The Black Music That Isn't Either, that the way that the author looks at rap music, he doesn't see it as for blacks or as music. The author makes the point that rap music has been misunderstood and seen possibly in the wrong way by white listeners. He says that rap music has changed over time in the way it sounds. It has taken many different forms from the type of people rapping to the type of lyrics to the appropriateness of the way it sounds. The people listening to the music has also changed over time. Whites used to be very against this type of music, while recently they have adapted to it. Many white people try to adapt to the music by maybe dressing in baggy clothing, dressing like a wigger, a term used to categorize that type of clothing for whites.

Online Research

I did the research for my profile of a community member today. I found a lot of information on Tim Baechler. It was pretty easy to find the type of information that I was looking for. It seemed that there was a few websites talking about him. There was a lot of information that talked about his accomplishments and his awards. He has done a lot of good things with his football team. I can't wait to put the whole paper together and complete it. It should hopefully turn out good!

Contact with Member of Community

I made contact with the member of the community I choose to write about today. His name is Tim Baechler. He is the head coach of the Canton High School football team. When I went to see him today, he seemed like he was interested in helping me out. I asked him if there was a good time for me to come and interview him and he told me that anytime after school would be fine. I am thinking that this interview and the paper should go pretty well.

Live from Death Row

The article that we are supposed to read for class tomorrow, Live from Death Row, was a little bit sad. Although prisoners deserve the treatment they are given, since they have done bad things themselves, I think that it is still sad to think about the things they go through. For any "normal" person to go through the things that prisoners go through would be horrible. Thinking about the conditions of prisons and the violence in the prisons hurt in a way. It is sad to think about the life that was taken away from these men and women who are placed in prisons.

Profile of a Community Member

We were given our next paper topic today. The topic is to write about a community member. I am not quite sure who exactly I would like to write about someone from one of the three high schools on that campus. I was very involved in my high school and a lot of the people that work there have made an impact on my life. I was thinking either a teacher or a coach would be good members of the community to be interviewed. I think that I should try to make this paper very good and make sure my interview goes well.

Very Interesting

I may be repeating myself in this post but I felt that I had to say a few things about my paper so far. I finished interviewing my final person tonight and I really enjoyed it. It made really appreciate this area that I grew up in and have been to so many times. As this person described the difference in the buildings, I pictured every place how it is now and tried to picture what it had looked like then. I knew a lot of places had changed and most of the newer buildings I actually remember when they were built, but it was fun to hear about the older places. I have lived in the Plymouth/ Canton and now Northville area all of my life and I used to frequent Downtown Plymouth a lot. I'm glad that we were given this assignment so that I had the opportunity to learn more about one of my favorite places!

Analysis Paper- What I've Learned

I have learned a lot so far from this analysis paper. I have always enjoyed going to Downtown Plymouth and learning more about it has made me appreciate the area much more. I feel that everyone should know more about the area that they live in. This paper was a good idea, especially since most of us don't really know that much about where we live.

After interviewing my grandma, I felt that I learned more than I did with the research I did. I am not going to go into everything that I learned since it will all be in my paper anyway. I am almost done writing the paper & I can't wait to see how the whole thing turns out!

Jiving with Java

While reading Jiving with Java, I thought about the coffee houses I have had experience with. I am not a fan of coffee at all... although I recently found a delicious cappiccino from Tim Hortons that barely had the coffee flavor in it at all. When or if I go to coffee houses, I like to watch the people around and see what kind of people they are. There is a local coffee shop in downtown Plymouth that I used to go to with my mom when I was younger. This coffee shop reminded me of exactly what the article explained the coffee houses to be like; it had unmatching furniture and different colored walls. I would sit with my mom for hours while she read and I, I actually have no idea what I did for that long. It was relaxing and fun though, I enjoyed those times.

I do see the coffee houses becoming a very popular thing. It seems as though everyone visits coffee shops and it makes me wish I enjoyed coffee as much as they do!

Analysis Paper Progress

I wanted to start out this post explaining something that I saw this weekend. I went to the auto show with my friends and afterward we went to greek town for dinner. As we were walking around I saw something that caught my eye; a greek restaurant called "Niki's"! I thought it was interesting that I just happened upon it. We thought about eating there but decided on some place else. I just thought it was ironic.

The paper gave me some trouble this weekend. I had a hard time figuring out exactly what topic I wanted to write about. I finally decided that I would write about the transformation of downtown Plymouth throughout the years. I have seen a lot of these changes recently. My grandparents have lived in Plymouth for more than 30 years and I interviewed them. I have not actually started writing the paper but I feel like I have a good start so far.

Favorite Post

This picture was my favorite post. I thought that it showed Detroit in a good way and made it look better than it actually is.

Analysis Paper

I have figured out a bunch of different topics I could write about for my analysis paper. I grew up in Plymouth and have visited the downtown more times than I can remember. It is a cute little town, a couple streets surrounding "Kellogg Park" (a fountain & benches & grass to run around, its fun!). A lot of things have changed and become "better" in downtown Plymouth over the years. These were the ideas I came up with...

-transformation throughout the years
-chain stores becoming popular
-removal of the Penn Theater (one screened, played older movies)
-"mom & pop" stores being bought out
-old pharmacy
-fountain
-picture of old downtown in "Pennimen Deli"

Homeplace: A Site of Resistance

I thought it was really sad how the story started off. The woman was remembering when she was a child and she would go to her grandparents house. She talked about the walk there and how she was always scared because it was a walk through the white neighborhood. If I was in that situation, I would have felt very vulnerable and out of place. I probably would have described the situation in the same way that she did. I found it interesting that she talked about how she called it her "grandma's house". Whenever I am going to my grandparents house, I say I am going to my grandma's. I am not sure if it is for the same reason, "because the house belonged to women", or if it just because she is the one usually home.
I had a hard time understanding the rest of the story. I thought that the encounter in the neighborhood would be returned to later in the story but it was not. It was a good transition to the reading but I found it hard to understand what was going on after that. It basically described how the black woman lived when there was slavery and after. The black woman would leave her home to go take care of a white family's home. Her family would be worried about her the whole time she was gone. The black woman had different ways of looking at the world and her life.

Walk Around Neighborhood

I recently moved to a new subdivision in the middle of nowhere in Northville. Half of the subdivision is full of homes but the half that my house is on has very few homes. Lately a lot of homes have been built though. Two lots away from mine a house is currently being built; it is interesting to see the progress every day when I come home.
The other night when I was driving home, I saw three deer in front of my neighbors house. I've seen deer before as well, it's always exciting to see. My mom and grandma have both seen turkeys on numerous occasions walking around our yard. Although they have seen them, I have yet to see them.
Since it is a new neighborhood, there isn't really a lot to notice. Our neighborhood is pretty nice though, I enjoy living here and seeing the things around the area.

First Week of Classes

The first week of classes is over and I feel like this semester should be a good one. This comp class seems to be interesting. I think that the type of papers we have to write seem to be more exciting than the ones that I have written in other classes. In my previous composition class we were not given topics to write about but instead had no boundaries and I found it very hard to pick a topic and stay excited about it while writing the paper. I am hoping that I succeed in this class and end up with a good grade. I'm sure that's what everyone wants though. My goal for this semester is to just be a good student and get the things accomplished that I need to.

"Nikki's Window"

Herron makes it a point to argue how he sees the city known as "Greek Town". Through description, he gives the reader a clear picture of what this area, including Monroe Street, look like and how everyone acts there. He makes it known that this area is no longer what it used to be. The streets are lined with restaurant after restaurant; other building that are not necessary line the streets as well. The people that roam the streets are no longer members of this city, but those who have traveled to visit the interesting streets. Most of the people have great money and choose to spend it in this area; they are mostly white except for a few teenagers here and there. Herron makes it a point to explain how "Nikki's Window" came into place and the importance of what previously held its spot.
The three terms can easily be defined in Herron's writing. Pastness can be defined as what it used to look like around there. The bricks were the same colors as the buildings were in the past and there is no longer another building in this city that looks the same. Nostalgia can be defined as something that people would like to be informed about. People have longing to know about the history of this city just as they long to be in this city. Humiliation refers to the amount of fear that Detroit brings to other Americans pride. People fear what they do not know and it seems that they do not understand what it is like in this city.