New York Behind the Curtain— What Is The "Real" New York?

So here we are, about a month or two into my freshman year of fashion school in the Big City. Calling New York my new home has definitely been a change, and as far as the city goes, I think I'm in love. With its beautiful cityscapes and the energetic buzz that emotes from every individual on the street, it's hard not to fall into the glamorized trap that is New York.

On the flip side, you can't forget the endless rows of trash on the streets and the subtle suspicion you feel when you are at the subway station alone (don't even get me started on the W4th Serial Puncher). Seeing as this aspect of New York is always missed in every influencer's “Day In My Life” post, it's no surprise so many people feel “cat-fished” by the city.

Source: All photographs were taken by the author

It’s easy to come here having rose-colored glasses on, assuming that after watching all 6 seasons of Sex and the City and Gossip Girl, you have the perfect picture of New York. Of course, when arriving here and the first thing you see is a homeless man screaming at a wall, it's not unreasonable to feel sort of disappointed. Pop culture and the media have perpetuated a glamorized urban landscape that only shows 2% of what the actual city is like.

Being the overachiever I am, I made sure to head into the city being 100% sure of what I was getting myself into. I knew that I needed to do some serious research to get to the bottom of what the “real” New York is like. Of course, I had my suspicions that the social media persona of the city was more than likely a facade, so I felt even more driven to start researching. I went to the most informative and trustworthy form of research I knew: TikTok.

Being the platform that it is, it was interesting to get a wide range of viewpoints on the subject. You could watch a video about an influencer having a fabulous stroll around SoHo, but also see another video about a rat carrying a piece of pizza down the sidewalk. Doing this deep dive made it only more obvious that people glamorize this city.

This romanticized New York can really mess with people's perception of what New York City living is. Based on social media alone, most people would assume that life in the big city means endless parties and daily events. Hell, even I came into it half expecting a full schedule, but the fact of the matter is that most days, I am alone. That's another topic they don't cover in the influencer’s guide to the “Big Apple”— Loneliness.

Being in a city that millions of people call home, it can be hard to think of it as lonely, but that's the thing with loneliness; no matter how many people surround you, you can still feel isolated. I think loneliness is one of those universal experiences that every New Yorker has at least once while living here, and yet it still isn't talked about in pop culture. Just to give you an example, the show Friends is based in New York City. There are six of them, and I am having trouble finding one.

There is no how-to on making friends here, and I think that is one of the harder lessons to learn. In my case, being surrounded by people my age causes an utter sense of isolation, but all you can do is try and connect with people. Especially in a city that can feel fabricated, looking for real connections can seem challenging but are ultimately worth it. Reaching out to those around you is your best chance at making friends, but this city won't make them for you.

New York—perhaps the most glamorized city in the world— has so much to offer other than the fictitious persona that everyone wants to believe. It's real, and raw, and authentic; full of all walks of life. The “real” New York is full of beauty as well as chaos, and if you can absorb the city in its entirety, that's when you've found it.