New York Sign Language Street Vendors Take a Bite Out of the Big Apple By BOB YAMPOLSKY	フレームで見る  英文をプリントする  脚注をプリントする
ＮＹの街を支配する露店商 ニューヨークの街には多くの食べ物の露店があります。朝はベーグル、昼はホットドッグ、おやつにはピーナッツ菓子まで売っています。わずか数ドルの物を売って生計を立てている露店商は、商売方法もシビア。あの手この手で少しでも代金を払わせようとします。

"May I suggest," says our sign for the month, "you have that with a schmear?"

I will try to explain why this is funny. Or perhaps I should say, why some people might think it funny. The person — or rather, cartoon character — saying this is a Texan. He is using a Yiddish word: schmear. That is the extent of the joke.

I should explain that in New York, which has the largest Jewish population of any city in the world, Yiddish expressions are quite common. Schmear, meaning a spread (like cream cheese) that is applied to breads (like bagels) is fairly well known. Texas, on the other hand, has very few Jews. In fact, while New York and Texas do belong to the same country, I think that most New Yorkers and most Texans would agree that the two places are, culturally speaking, polar opposites. New York is Woody Allen. Texas is the Lone Ranger.

But I have strayed from my topic before even starting on it. My topic this month is the food one can buy on the streets of Manhattan. Starting in the morning, the breakfast vendors hit the streets. Appearing on the cart of one of these vendors is our sign for the month. These vendors sell primarily bagels, dougnuts and muffins, as well as coffee and tea.

These vendors sell most of their goods by 10 a.m., but they usually stay on the street for another hour or two and then they hitch their cart to their car and drive back home to New Jersey, where most of them apparently live. By this time the lunch vendors have taken their places.

There's a bit more variety to the lunch menu. The classic New York street vendor is the hot dog vendor, with the umbrella over his stand and the hot dogs swimming around in a tank of oily hot water. He also sells a type of food that I have only seen in New York, and only at these street stands: big, soft, salted pretzels, which you eat with mustard.

But the hot dog vendor has been getting a lot of competition lately, mainly from vendors with grills who will take your order and cook your meal while you wait. Some serve standard American fare — hamburgers, cheeseburgers, cheese steak sandwiches. Others make Greek sandwiches, called gyros, made of lettuce, tomato and something that looks like meat wrapped in pita bread.

There really aren't any vendors specializing in dinner — which makes sense, of course, since most people eat at home. But in the late afternoon the nut sellers come out. They sell peanuts and cashews roasted with a sweet caramel covering — a little snack for the commute home.

There is one class of street vendor that is outside from morn ing to evening: the fruit vendor. Fruit vendors are a fairly new phenomenon, and I have to say I like them very much — they are about the only ones who sell food that is actually healthful. But I also have to say that I have found these fruit sellers to be rather difficult characters.

Once I bought a selection of fruit that totaled $1.60 (¥190). I handed over $2 (¥240), and for change the fruit seller gave me ... two plums. I was too dumbstruck to protest. Then there was the fellow from whom I regularly bought grapes. I'd ask for a pound and he'd give me two or three. When I objected he'd say, "They're cheap, only $1 a pound (453g)." And if I objected further he would take another small bunch of grapes, add it to my bag and say that he was throwing it in for free. But I'd still be buying three times as many grapes as I wanted. His mouth would be smiling, but his eyes would glare and his hands were saying: "hurry up and hand over the money." After a while, I decided to counter this by picking out and weighing the grapes myself.

Once when I was about to buy grapes I was a witness to high drama: a showdown on the streets of Manhattan over two bananas. The players were the fruit vendor and a businessman in a very nice suit, who bought the bananas, for 50 cents, and handed over $1. When the vendor handed over the change — two quarters — one of the quarters fell to the ground. The momentous question arose: Who was going to pick it up? The businessman felt it was the vendor's fault. The businessman picked up the quarter but told the vendor that he should at least get an apology. All the vendor gave him was a murderous stare.

The businessman continued with his lecture, which had no effect, so he grew angrier still and put the two bananas he had bought back down on the cart and said, "OK, give me back my money." This had become quite interesting now, and more than a few people were watching as the drama approached its climax.

I knew the answer, of course. Those of us who work in offices — no matter how nice our suits or hefty our salaries — are no match for these men who make their living on the streets and count their earnings in quarters and dollar bills. The fruit vendor merely kept glaring, until the businessman gave in, picked up his two bananas again and hurried off to the sanctuary of his office.

The fruit man turned to me and smiled, showing sharp white teeth. "A pound of green grapes," I said. He picked out two large bunches. The scale read 3 3/4 pounds. I handed over my money without objection.

Shukan ST: Feb. 26, 1999

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