only in nyc can one pay $2100 a month to live in one room. one room in a “luxury” apartment building, at least according to the bright yellow and red plastic sign hanging on the 52nd street side wall of the building itself. i suppose that right there should have been my first clue. the sign was the first red flag i ignored – but i was excited to be back in the 50’s and even more so to have a doorman & a dishwasher. although i was told it would be freshly painted and i arrived to find that it was not, it still seemed to be a step up from e. 73rd street. the other benefits of living in this “luxury” building include rats, roaches & maggots, mounds and mounds of garbage both inside & out, foul smells, an un-air-conditioned lobby, elevators that could be used as sweat lodges, angry renters, a revolving staff of temporary doormen & porters with keys to every apartment a sociopath owner & much unanticipated drama.
i’ll start at the beginning. when i arrived in the beginning of april, i was elated. so happy, that i disregarded the fact that i had been lied to about the fresh coat of paint. since i had planned on staying for a while, i figured i would eventually want to paint the place myself anyway. here you can see an example of my luxury apartment.
clearly there was not a fresh coat of paint to be found anywhere in the place –
but still – i was now living in a “luxury” doorman building!
2 months after i arrived, the staff went on strike. the remainder of my first year included relentless drama and my first introduction to true psychopathy. my landlord, i had come to discover, is a psychopath. a real psychopath – like the clinical definition states.
an entire website has been created to record the events of 2012. it’s titled, east 52nd street reality show, luxury living in midtown. i assure you everything written on this site is true – as hard as you may find it to believe!
