Simple(r) Life - From Big Apple to Big Peach

created 5/21/2002, posted on 5/23/2002

Now it's Saturday night. I am sitting in a coffeeshop, writing this e-journal because I have nothing better to do. Like that old song from Saturday Night Fever "I'm going nowhere, somebody help me!" Later, I have a bus to catch, or I will be trapped here after 11:00 PM. I am not in New York anymore. Many things don't run after 11:00pm. Many buses don't even run at weekends.

Welcome to Atlanta - The Big Peach (this is not a name actually used very often by locals. But you can see a big peach on the Georgia license plate and there are at fifty streets called peachtree something. I think Big Peach is a good name to refer to. But damn, I haven't seen a single peach in my neighborhood supermarket yet!)

Still, Atlanta is better than Baltimore (here I go again! still complaining about Bore-Me-More, after all these years). In Baltimore, Metro (the elevated rapid transit system) doesn't even run on Sunday and it hardly gets you anywhere interesting (I never thought Inner Harbor is that fun. Neither is Johns Hopkins Hospital - the final station of Baltimore Metro). I always said, "the best public transportation in Baltimore is MARC train. It takes you all the way to Washington, DC for about $10 dollars round-trip. And that is usually I went for fun weekends when living in Baltimore..." But, when can I go for fun in Atlanta? Fly on Delta Express to Washington. DC?

It takes about $200 on a Delta flight to DC (or $215 to New York), so I think I'd better find weekend fun locally. Fortunately, unlike Baltimore Metro, MARTA (Atlanta's elevated rapid transit system) does take people somewhere (most important, of course, the airport - the busiest one in the world!), including this Midtown coffeeshop currently I'm sitting in.

It takes people to Art Center, where the Opera, Symphony Hall, and some theaters are located. There is also a famous art museum (High Museum of Art) just outside of the MARTA station. And It is only one stop south of where I live. It also takes people to Buckhead's (I live at the south end of this community) two gigantic shopping malls: Lenox Mall and Phipps Plaza. These two malls have almost all the high-end boutiques you can imagine and it is only one stop north of where I live. Though I'm not a big mall rat, at least there are 12 cinema theaters I can go to see movies (unfortunately, it seems that these days the mall theaters show only two movies: Spyder-Men and Star War Episode 2000). These malls actually make Atlanta more appealing to my out-of-town friends (None of my friends intend to visit me here yet). One friend just told me: "That two malls alone might persuade me to visit you in Atlanta. I can spend one day at the CNN Studio, Stone Mountain; then two days in the malls." Oh, welcome...

Two stops south of my stop, it is in the heart of Midtown. Just outside the station, there is the renovated Margaret Mitchell (The author of "Gone with the Wind") House. There are several restaurants and coffeeshops in this neighborhood (including this Caribou Coffeeshop I am sitting) And about 6 blocks away, it is Atlanta's largest urban park - Piedmont Park. It is a cute park without too many trees. It is cherished and beloved by locals but I think it is actually smaller than Brooklyn's Prospect Park. About 4 stops south from here, it is Atlanta's core downtown area. I rarely go there since I moved to the Big Peach. I guess, just as other typical American cities (read: outside of New York), downtown is usually not the most desirable part of a town. But if you are looking for some fun tourist things to do, you can find CNN Headquarter (with a cool studio tour), Coca-Cola Museum (All you can drink here until you busted), Underground Atlanta (sort of cheesy, if you ask me) all near this stop. So I guess, for a tourist, public transportation in Atlanta is really not that bad. Most points of interest can be reached by MARTA. But I cannot live like a tourist does everyday. I have to do things like locals.

Unfortunately, I just did something the locals rarely do: referring to places and measuring distance between points by MARTA stops, instead by interstate highway and miles. Because, no, I - do - NOT- have - a- car.

Often, I also ask directions by referring to bus routes. Usually I am given a strange look and a reply "Sorry, I don't take bus so I don't know what you are talking about." Obviously, I am a real social outcast here.

If you know my love/hate complex with driving, it is not hard to understand why I still don't have a car. It might not be a such big deal in New York, Boston, or even Washington, DC. But in Atlanta, it is surely making me socially handicapped. But I figured I would only be here for six months, why should I buy a such big, expensive thing I am not even confident in operating? I can spend that money on some luxurious hotel on a Mediterranean island. Or at least on HBO subscription, so I can spend some quality time with that 4 slutty women in "Sex and The City."

After I made my mind I would not have a car in Atlanta, I started to arrange my moving according to this. I found a place just across street from one of the largest MARTA stations. There are more than a dozen buses originating from this station. Included is Bus 39, which takes me to work everyday. Route 39 goes along Buford Highway, the most 'exotic' road in Atlanta due to its abundance of Hispanic and Asian restaurants and groceries (sort of like Lower East Side's Clinton Street, but 100 times longer). If there is no traffic jam, it usually takes me to my office in less than 15 minutes. 39 is relatively frequent even though it is not punctual (most Atlanta buses are not anyway). Now commuting is no longer such a big pain like in New York. There are two swimming pools, a computer lab (with high-speed connection), and a nice gym in my apartment complex. Every household is allowed to have two parking spots (obviously useless for me). My balcony has a nice view of a Renaissance styled fountain. While the one-bed room unit I rent is not really that big, I did get lost in the morning the first few days I was there (Another sign that I am not in New York anymore). And overall, I still pay about one third less than I paid in Manhattan. Atlanta is not exactly a cheap city (compared to...mm, Baltimore, if you ask me) and Buckhead definitely is one of the prime address is the Big Peach. But I definitely feel my quality of life (QoL) has improved from life in New York. That is, if you don't count destitute in social life as one of the QoL index. But with the money I save from the rent, I do have the budget to arrange my TV date with Sarah Jessica Parker.

So life just became much simpler. No nightclubbing (no bus after 11pm), no art-house moving going (I have Sundance Channel and Independent Film Channel in my cable subscription); and (sadly) I no longer need to worry about which new fancy restaurants to bring my friends to. Because most restaurants here are just mediocre, I finally started to do a lot of cooking again. Maybe moving to Atlanta is a blessing. A question some Taiwanese friends like to ask me is: "So how is the Chinese restaurant in Atlanta? Are they authentic?" I just answer " Well, it is okay. I cannot complain too much. Because so far all the Chinese food I've eaten were cooked by myself."

Maybe I will find a bus route leading to some great Chinese restaurants. Then I will report back to you.