Adventures of Urban Life

Katherine Pimentel

I arrived at Bay Plaza Shopping Center on a cold and windy Wednesday afternoon at around three. My first observation was the parking lot which was pretty empty. This surprised me because shopping centers are usually full especially during the afternoons, but one must keep in mind that in the city many New Yorkers rely on public transportation. The Bx 12 conveniently takes one right into the shopping center which makes it easily accessible to those individuals who do not have cars. Another reason why the parking lot was empty could have been because many people were still at work and could not make it until after five.
The first store I entered was a Marshalls there was a good amount of customers in there, mostly women. They were looking to find great bargains being that Marshalls carries designer items at discounted prices. The women crowded themselves around the shoe area and tried on all sorts of shoes. Every once in a while they would comment on the shoes that some one else had on as if they were helping them make a decision. The store in general was a mess, the costumers made this worse by dropping things and acting like they did not notice so that they would not have to pick it up.
The Barnes and Nobles at Bay Plaza had a completely different atmosphere than the clothing stores. It was very quiet, yet had the most people. I was surprised to see how many people were in there. In the Starbucks the customers sat and sipped their coffee with a book in hand. Almost everyone was there alone minding their business. I sat by the magazine section to do my observations for about half an hour and the same people that were there when I got there remained when I left. Perhaps the cold weather enticed them to stay in the store with a warm drink and read a book. The people would take a magazine and literally read the entire thing instead of flipping through it and buying it if there was a topic of interest. The man next to me was reading a comic book that looked like it was very entertaining because ever so often he would chuckle and he did not take his eyes off that book. There were a few people who looked like they did not come into the bookstore for anything specific, maybe they just wanted to be in a quite space and gather their thoughts because they just sat down and watched everything around them, kind of like what I was doing.
My experience in Bay Plaza was interesting because I am used to seeing malls that are crowed and always have something going on. Bay Plaza lacked that energy I expected. The amount of people in the Barnes and Nobles should serve as a hint to any one thinking about opening up a bookstore in the Bronx because there clearly seems to be some type of demand for books or the type of atmosphere that a book store brings.