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  • The Trylon is now a Bukharan synagogue. That happened about a year ago, after failed attempts to landmark the outside of the building. Bukharans are Jews from former Soviet republics, such as Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, etc. They are very traditional Orthodox Jews. The Bukharan community in Rego Park started in the late 1980s, and is now legendary (e.g. “Regostan”) They’re the ones responsible for all the great kebab places, pharmacies and newer synagogues on 108th Street. (If you can read Cyrillic or took chemistry or calculus in school, you can figure out that the word for pharmacy is something like “Apoteka” - i.e. apothecary)

    Re: signs with no English - wasn’t that the topic of a recent Queens Crap story about Korean and Chinese signs in Flushing?

    Posted by Mickiet
    on September 9th, 2007 at 12:02 am

  • I’ve always been confused about the orthodoxy of many Bukharian Jews. After all, religion was officially suppressed in the Soviet Union, and most Russian Jews lost their religiosity in that time. (One Jewish woman who grew up in Moscow once told me that her family ate pork only because there often wasn’t anything else to eat.) What made the Bukharians different? Was it that the central government didn’t really care what happened in the sticks?

    Posted by Steve
    on September 9th, 2007 at 12:35 am

  • Welcome Back. I wanted to help Peter33 out, and he gave me the directions to try and put a post, but it didn’t work out. Oh well.

    Posted by Michael1
    on September 9th, 2007 at 11:01 am

  • “They are very traditional Orthodox Jews….”

    They ain’t that traditional — I have seen more than a fair share of teenagers, returning from High Holiday services, tresspassing on the properties of the buildings surrounding the Ohr Torah Institute (or whatever they’ve remaned it), behaving badly and smoking the ol’ “wacky weed”….

    Posted by MaryJane
    on September 9th, 2007 at 11:28 am

  • Maryjane - “traditional” doesn’t always mean “well behaved”, in any religion, be it Catholic, Jewish or whatever. By “traditional”, I mean that in a way that could apply to any religion: for example, where women are not allowed to lead services or be religious leaders, where dress codes and family status are very codified or have a lot of “unwritten rules”, where perhaps the sexes are separated, where everyone is taught the strictest, most literal letter of the law - Now, whether they abide by it? That’s another story…

    Posted by mickiet
    on September 9th, 2007 at 6:45 pm

  • Steve, I noticed your rec for the Grand Case Beach Club. But I didn’t notice any beach to lie out and swim into. How do you swim over there, or is it just snorkeling?

    Posted by Anonymous
    on September 10th, 2007 at 3:07 pm

  • There are actually two little beaches. There’s no huge bustling beach scene at the GCBC, so I wouldn’t recommend it if that’s your thing, but instead there are two small beaches separated by the hotel restaurant that are quite laid-back and serene. I very much preferred it like that, truth be told. My side had the smaller one, a strip of sand backing up to a stone wall — as you walked down it in the direction of my room, the sand eventually ended and the water started going all the way up to the stone. (There were stairs right outside my room that led down to the water — not the sand, but the water. Of course, farther along, you could also go down onto the sand.) There are plenty of chairs provided.

    Because the smaller beach was so quiet and convenient, I didn’t spend a lot of time at the other one, but the main differences are that it’s wider and a little longer, umbrellas are available, and — most importantly — it’s within view of the bar, so if you raise the blue flag on your beach chair, someone will come over and bring you a drink.

    So yeah, don’t worry — there’s plenty of beach to shove off from. And you can snorkel, too, for free! But if you’re looking to fight for space, you’re out of luck. It’s sort of like sharing a private beach with some other lucky people.

    Here’s a photo I took of the smaller beach:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/3.....343476341/

    And I guess I didn’t take any straight photos of it, but you can sort of see the larger beach in this photo of the restaurant:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/3.....343477395/

    Posted by Steve
    on September 10th, 2007 at 3:22 pm

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Late-night trip down QB

Posted by Steve on Saturday, September 8th, 2007

I’m back! Saint Martin was nice and all, but it’s no Queens. But seriously! It was a fabulous time, the Caribbean Sea (not the beach, the Caribbean Sea) being a few steps down from our two-bedroom, two-and-a-half bath upgraded suite. If you plan on any tropical travel in the near or far future, I highly recommend the Grand Case Beach Club. Trust me on this.

I made one very big mistake: Booking the return flight into Newark. Those of us who live in Central Queens should never fly into Newark for any reason. The late-night car trip back from the airport ran a cool $100 including toll and a generous-but-not-insane tip. And that was the best deal I got after calling three different car services (for the record, the winner was Dial 7, formerly Tel Aviv but changed to attract anti-Semites, I guess).

I learned a few things sitting in the cushy leather back seat on the way home. You can learn them, too, after the jump.

  • Tangra Wok, the respected “Asian fusion” restaurant in Rego Park, has a new sign that looks — surprise! — much worse than the old sign. The old one, if I recall correctly, was understated and classy. Now it’s “Tangra Wok Bistro,” which makes it sound less appealingly exotic and more like a place that serves bad Niçoise salad. The sign itself is now red and lights up. I’d like to see a new law that bans all illuminated signs, wouldn’t you? Hoboken instituted such a policy to great success. But fat chance on that one here.
  • The former Trylon Theater is now all Russian’d up! The famed marquee is now cheap and hideous and features an out-of-place looking red Cyrillic inscription. I think it translates as “NO ENGLISH SPOKEN HERE,” but my Russian skills (that is Russian, isn’t it?) are admittedly suspect. There’s some English, too, but it’s inconspicuous and isn’t really English anyway — it appears to be Hebrew transliterated into the Latin alphabet. Can you think of any businesses or community centers located in the United States of America that have signs with no English whatsoever? I can’t, and I live right next to Rego Park.
  • The Ugliest Block in Forest Hills, former location of the much-beloved Mickey’s Place sushi joint (now inconveniently located in Bayside), is a little less uglier and a whole lot brighter with the opening of a new lighting place.

Hey, thanks to Peter33 for the My Kitchen update while I was away. You’re welcome to post anything you want anytime.