Meet NYC's $15 Wedding Photographer!
Plus! When your car gets stuck in the Holland Tunnel!! A tech solution for long-talkers!!!
Hello everyone,
Welcome to Issue #123 of CAFÉ ANNE!
Oh man, a lot of comments on last week's story about dealing with long-talkers. A theme emerged: folks don't just have problems with long-talkers, they're also fed up with fast-talkers and slow-talkers and silent types and interrupters and long-pausers.
This all started to seem very funny and got me marveling at how, for the most part, we all seem to be muddling through okay despite the many differences in how we talk and prefer others to talk.
The top comment came from reader Tina N. who suggested a tech solution to the problem of long-talkers:
“I’ve long had a dream of inventing wearable conversation monitors that show what percentage of time each person has been talking. Then you know if you’re at 75%, you need to zip it and let the other get to 50%. Any tech ppl out there who can build this? Let’s Shark Tank it!”
I’ve often thought the same thing! So then I wondered, maybe someone has already built such a device?
A quick search turned up the sociometric badge—a wearable monitor developed by MIT researchers that measures all sorts of conversation stats including how long each person talks and how much they’re interrupting.
Alas, while the team produced a research paper explaining the device and its uses, it seems as though nothing came of it. I'm hoping to speak with the developers soon so I can bully them into commercializing this marvelous technology.
In other news, regular readers will be interested to learn there is a new tune in the Spotify top-50 titled “Type Shit.” I’d include some sample lyrics, but the whole song is so unbelievably filthy from start to finish that I can’t find a single line that isn’t NSFW. Which is quite an accomplishment, when you think about it.
Finally, huge summer-is-here shoutouts to our newest paid subscriber, Suzanne M. That’s enough $$$ for ten Mister Softee chocolate-vanilla twist cones—which I promise to eat in one sitting!
I’m very excited for this week’s issue, of course. We’ve got an account of what it’s like when your car breaks down in the Holland Tunnel, plus a visit with Braulio Cuenca, the city’s very unofficial $15 wedding photographer. Please enjoy.
Regards!
Anne
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TRAFFIC REPORT
“My Car Broke Down in the Holland Tunnel!”
Is there a New Yorker alive who hasn't considered the terrifying prospect of breaking down in the Holland Tunnel? There is, after all, no place to pull over, and it’s always jammed—with fellow New Yorkers, the most impatient people on earth!
This worst case scenario happened earlier this month to my friend Christine from the meditation center, sort of. When she emailed to say her life was a little hectic these days because her SUV had broken down three times—including an incident in the Holland Tunnel—I had to hear more.
Christine is also in the middle of moving from Brooklyn back to her hometown in North Carolina, so we caught up in a Zoom call last weekend.
The Holland Tunnel, for those not familiar, is a terrifying 1.5-mile thoroughfare running under the Hudson River between Tribeca in Lower Manhattan and Jersey City in the United States. More than 100,000 cars a day jam the narrow lanes running in each direction. The tunnel has no shoulders. One wrong move and you're toast—along with everyone around you!
Christine said her SUV likely broke down in protest. The 2002 Nissan Xterra, which she bought for $3000 and has 134,000 miles, is a classic NYC beater—not much to look at, but highly reliable.
"The majority of her life, she was just kind of sitting in Brooklyn because that's what happens when you're a New Yorker," said Christine of her vehicle. "A car just kind of sits there until you want to go camping or something like that. So that's what she was doing. I guess she liked it, hanging out in Brooklyn—you don't want to leave."
The trouble started when Christine decided to move back to North Carolina—at least temporarily—to be with her family. She was driving back and forth in preparation for the move, "And every time I left New York, it didn't want to go," she said.
The first time the Nissan broke down, on Memorial Day, Christine was headed to North Carolina on the New Jersey freeway when it lost power and had to be towed back to the city. The culprit: a busted fuel pump. Christine called her family to say she’d be delayed. "Oh my God," they said. "Thank God it wasn't in the Holland Tunnel!"
Christine planned to make a second attempt the next weekend to avoid traffic, but her uncle died suddenly and she had to leave after her work day on a Monday—at rush hour. She set out with the SUV stuffed with her belongings and her miniature poodle, Bodhi, riding shotgun.
Traffic that evening was typical. It took more than an hour to gas up and drive through Downtown Brooklyn and Chinatown. When Christine got to the tunnel at 6:30 pm, traffic was at its usual crawl approaching the entrance. The speed picked up a bit once she was under the river. And that's when smoke started billowing from under the hood. A LOT of smoke.
Christine pulled into the right lane, flicked on the hazard signal and slowed way down, hoping the smoke would clear. It got worse.
“There's this moment where you're like, 'Oh crap, this is happening in the Holland Tunnel!" she said. “Then remembered I had camping fuel in the car. And so I thought, 'Oh my God, I am going to blow up.' I didn't know if the car was on fire."
She stopped the car in the right lane, turned off the engine and got out to do a flame check. No fire. She got back in the Nissan and called 911. She was shaking, pumped with adrenaline, and her voice was cracking. The dispatcher was calm. "Are you northbound or southbound?" he asked. What?
"I'm headed towards New Jersey!" she said.
The dispatcher said help was on the way. "It was a very efficient process," she said. "Not much emotion at all."
There's a set of emergency responders stationed on either side of the tunnel. Christine had no idea how far in she was, but there are cameras installed every few feet along the entire route, so authorities can easily locate a stalled vehicle. And while traffic may back up behind a stalled car, the lane in front will clear, allowing responders access from the exit side of the tunnel.
Christine knew none of this. And her SUV was still smoking, which was terrifying, as was the prospect of all the angry drivers backing up behind her. "I thought people are going to be pissed, because I'm holding everyone up," she said. "I was prepared for chaos."
To her surprise, traffic continued to flow in the left lane. No one honked, no one flipped the bird, no one even paused. A few seemed to acknowledge her situation as they drove by, but in a humorous, friendly way.
"It's just cool to see the adaptability of New Yorkers," said Christine. "They're just like, 'You're breaking down, you've got a smoking car in the Holland Tunnel, and I'm moving on.'"
Christine's reaction, meanwhile: "I gotta get out of the Holland Tunnel!"
While waiting for the emergency responders, she called her Brooklyn mechanic. And he picked up! How often does that happen?
"This is Christine with the green Nissan, and I'm in the Holland Tunnel, and my car is smoking," she told him. "Is it okay to drive it?"
Looking back, she attributes her presence of mind to her meditation practice, including the meditation she did just before the trip.
"I can't break down today!" she’d told herself. "But then I was like, 'No, actually, you can break down. You may break down.' So I was a pre-prepared for it. I'd acknowledged the worst-case scenario, and here it was! I've done a lot of training, and my autopilot kicked in—no point in getting upset. It could have gone in the other direction—with me having an anxiety attack or something."
To her relief, Christine's mechanic gave her the go-ahead to try driving. She started the car and—slowly, with smoke still billowing from the hood—emerged on the Jersey side.
So that was a little anti-climatic! It's not that I wanted Christine to tell me her car blew up, but I was at least hoping for a tow-truck-in-the tunnel-situation. Instead, she pulled into a gas station just outside the tunnel and called 911 to give an update. Too late! Two firetrucks loaded with a dozen rescue workers arrived moments later.
Christine had already popped the hood and discovered the source of the smoke—a hose had burst, spilling antifreeze all over the engine.
"They were just like, "So your car's not on fire,'" Christine said. "And I'm like, 'No, I'm so sorry.'"
"Everyone had their gear on, ready to fight something big," she continued. "They seemed disappointed."
Christine got her Nissan towed back to Brooklyn a second time. And of course, it broke down again on a third attempt at the journey. But she finally made it to North Carolina, and now the car seems to running just fine. Perhaps it, too, has accepted the worst-case scenario.
Don't forget to move back, Christine! We will miss you!
What’s your worst NYC driving story? Post in the comments or email me: annekadet@yahoo.com
CITY SNAPSHOT
Meet NYC’s $15 Wedding Photographer!
Looking for a deal on a wedding photographer? Braulio Cuenca will capture your big day for the price of a roast beef sandwich.
A few weeks ago, when I spent a couple mornings interviewing newlyweds getting married at City Hall, I couldn't help notice the cheerful photographer stationed outside the city’s Marriage Bureau on Worth Street. "Flowers! Photos! Memories!" he called to the couples lined up on the steps.
Mr. Cuenca is NYC's extremely unofficial City Hall wedding photographer. Every weekday, he lingers outside the entrance, offering his services to couples getting hitched. He uses the granite ledge abutting the sidewalk to display sample photos and an array of fake flower bouquets the bride can borrow for the shoot. He also offers a selection of $15 wedding bands that folks can buy if they forgot to buy a ring. This happens more than you’d expect.
Last week, when I returned to ask Mr. Cuenca more about his business, I learned he has been photographing couples outside the Marriage Bureau for decades.
"25, 30 years," he said. "Maybe more! I don't know. The years go by too quick."
Mr. Cuenca moved to NYC from Ecuador when he was a teenager. He helped his father photograph tourists on the Coney Island boardwalk. He also paid his friends come to the boardwalk in rented character costumes to pose for photos with kids.
When he started shooting wedding photos outside City Hall in the early 90s, he charged $3 for a Polaroid snapshot. These days he charges $15 for a 5x7″ photo, taken with his $3000 27-megapixel Canon digital camera. He prints glossy photos on the spot using a small, battery-operated wireless printer.
While we were chatting, a middle-aged couple approached to examine his photo samples. The groom wore a black suit and a red dot tie with a gold clip. The bride wore a knee-length ivory dress, pearls and white sling-back sandals.
"How much you want?" asked the groom.
"$15," said Mr. Cuenca.
The groom scowled. “And you're not going to charge me any more?" he demanded.
"You want one picture, $15. You want two, that's $30," said Mr. Cuenca. "Two minutes! Let's go!"
Mr. Cuenca offers his customers a choice of posing by the building entrance or across the street by a rose garden in front the State Supreme Court building. The couple chose the garden.
Not wanting to intrude, I followed the party from a distance and hid behind a tree as Mr. Cuenca had the couple strike several poses. "Ready? Now look at each other! Smile!" he said.
The shoot went fast. Afterward, Mr. Cuenca had them select which photos to print. That took a lot longer.
They selected three shots. This would normally cost $45, but after an intense negotiation with the groom, Mr. Cuenca agreed to $40.
"I didn't want to fight him," he said later.
There was another tense moment when the groom paid for the photos with a $100 bill. Mr. Cuenca didn't have $60 in change, so he ran around the corner to the hot dog stand to break the bill. The hot dog vendor didn't have change, so he ran another block north on Centre Street to the breakfast cart guy, where he ordered a coffee. "Coffee regular, pequeño, like me!" he said.
But the breakfast cart guy didn't have change for a $100 either.
I finally realized I could just loan Mr. Cuenca a $20 bill from my wallet. We ran back to the impatient couple and Mr. Cuenca finished printing the photos.
The bride accused him of printing the wrong shots. But I had a feeling they would not have been happy no matter what Mr. Cuenca had done.
Mr. Cuenca typically arrives at 8:30 am to arrange his display and catch the first couples arriving to the Marriage Bureau, which performs ceremonies every 15 minutes, by appointment only. He works until the office shuts down at day’s end.
The bureau closes from 11:30 am to 1 pm and Mr. Cuenca buys his lunch at the steam table buffet around the corner, which sells food by the pound. The security guard who watches the Marriage Bureau entrance keeps an eye on the display of rings and bouquets so no one steals Mr. Cuenca's stuff.
Sometimes the whole day can go by without a single customer, but that's unusual, and on a good day, he will take home $300 to $400. "It's a living," says Mr. Cuenca, who lives in Corona, Queens and has four grown kids.
Some customers add tips—$5, $10, $20. Mr. Cuenca keeps them in a separate fund and distributes these earnings to folks who need help—friends, neighbors, family members.
He works year-round, even in the snow. "Sometimes too hot, sometimes too cold!" he said. "But I love it, what's not to love? Everyone is coming in happy."
The steps were now filling with potential customers and Mr. Cuenca, who had been very patient, clearly wanted to get back to work.
"Let me see if I have any more questions for you," I said, pulling a list from my bag. "I wrote them down."
"Too many questions!" said Mr. Cuenca.
We laughed and I left Mr. Cuenca alone to rustle up more business. As I headed back to the 4 train, I could hear him calling to the newlyweds: "Flowers, photos, memories!"
CAFÉ ANNE is a free weekly newsletter created by Brooklyn journalist Anne Kadet. Subscribe to get the latest issue every Monday!
Great recounting of Christine's Holland Tunnel saga - bad enough breaking down there of all places, but I can't imagine the stress of worrying that the vehicle might actually combust! But... [edited to be slightly less judgemental] really disappointed in the groom with (at least) $100 bucks in his pocket, who not only didn't TIP Braulio for the wedding photos, but actually nickel-and-dimed him for a discount? Bad form, dude. Bad form.
It really is rewarding to be a serial reader of this newsletter. I love all the back references and semi-in jokes. And seeing stories spin off from previous stories makes me so happy to be part of an intertwined world where these webs of association exist. Thank you for being so curious and creative!