New York Stories: Jean Grae

“What do you think this is? A hotel?!”

It was the only non-apropos statement that my mother used regularly. “It is a hotel,” I would mutter under my breath while slinking away. Except for that one time I yelled it back at her, which in retrospect was a terrible idea. I can see why she reacted, well... Not so lovingly.

I know what she meant. She didn’t want my friends traipsing in and out of the apartment at ridiculous hours, being loud, being teens. I never thought we were that bad, though. I respect the sentiment, but it was one she couldn’t use effectively. It just made me laugh. We did indeed live in a hotel. The Chelsea Hotel.

You would think that my mom would realize how unfitting the statement was, but I understand now why she didn’t. I don’t think the residents of the Chelsea ever thought of it as a “hotel” in that sense. It never felt like it. It was just home.

You know how weird it is, as a child, to explain to your friends that you live in a hotel? It’s pretty fucking weird.

“So what, like your family is poor and you have to live in a hotel?”

“No,” I would answer, angrily. “Why do you live in a hotel then?” they would prod.

“Because it’s the CHELSEA HOTEL. That’s DIFFERENT,” I’d retort, rolling my eyes. “It’s FAMOUS.”

“Whatever. You live in a hotel.”

Thankfully, the parents of my close friends were of the artsy and more alternative communities. They totally understood where their kids were staying for sleepovers. (Let’s be honest, it’s also a bit weird to tell your parents that you should be allowed to go spend the night at a hotel).

My parents moved there in 1977 and had the apartment until just last year. After the Chelsea was sold in 2011 and began its conversion into the boutique hotel it was destined to become, I had to decide whether or not I wanted to be vocal about the shitty treatment that the tenants were receiving. The management company is made up of terrible, terrible people. They told us we would all be fine, but they lied. Evictions, court, buyouts, health-harmful construction... It’s a whole other story. I had to move my mom and brother back to Cape Town, South Africa (where we are from). Our home of over 30 years is all a memory now.

Did that home impact my life? It did, in every possible way. I say a lot that, “I’m so motherfucking New York, you don’t even know.” And I absolutely mean it.

Let’s talk about growing up in that neighborhood, watching it change and evolve from the 1970s to 2013. I’ve seen the most extreme gentrification occur right on me. Which sounds like a strange choice of words, but it didn’t feel separate to my growth as a person, an adult, and definitely as an artist.

The ways that the community changed are mind-blowing. I remember my old block: the OTB, the bodegas, the comic-book store right downstairs, the fishing tackle shop (clearly we needed to go fishing on 23rd Street). The businesses that came and went; the ones that stood the test of time (see: El Quijote).

I grew up in the middle of everything. Literally between the 1, the A (which used to be the AA), and the C trains. My mom took us to Central Park every Saturday to watch the roller-skating circle or to ride the carousel (an easy trip if the train is half a block away). We walked to Macy’s on 34th and Seventh, and ate at the Fountain on the fifth floor every weekend. We didn’t have trees, a backyard, or a stoop, but we played in the marble hallways throughout the building.

I learned to ride a bike in the hallway. I learned to roller-skate there too (before going to Coco’s Roller Rink on Christopher Street). The Village was always just a walk away. It all seemed like one world, from my elementary school, P.S.3 on Hudson, up through Chelsea and into the Fashion District.

In my early teens, we were in the middle of all the clubs: Limelight, The Sound Factory, Home Bass, Octagon. We could walk down to Little West 12th and go to the Muse. I clubbed hard. I still have no idea how the hell they were letting us into these places when we were 12 years old, but I’m glad they did.

Walking to clubs all the way on the west side in Chelsea was walking through CHELSEA late at night. No, not the 2013 six-dollar-coffee Chelsea, but the old Chelsea. The projects are part of the neighborhood and always have been. Shit was not fucking sweet at all.

Walking down to West 4th Street to convene at 3rd and Sixth Avenue. Then you walk the circle: up Sixth Avenue to 8th Street, over to Broadway, down to 3rd and head right to Washington Square Park. Then you chill there forever. Walk the circle in different ways. My friends always came over because I lived so close. End up at Waverly Diner. Everyone back to crash at my house.

You know the movie Kids? Fuck that movie. We were in the park. They shot around us. That was us, portrayed poorly. Out of that group of friends came amazing rappers, skaters, artists, filmmakers and photographers. Sadly, a lot of mind-numbingly talented friends from that time are no longer around.

It was the same energy as the Chelsea, this new group of people. I felt it all the time in my building and I gravitated to it outside – my safe haven for mutants, misfits, people who “find their tribe.”

I thank my parents everyday for being artists. Besides the Chelsea, there wouldn’t have been another place for them to be accepted and to call home. It allowed me to grow up beyond limits, beyond filters, and with an acceptance of myself and others. I learned super-fucking-quickly about artistic pain, struggle and beauty. It wasn’t just inside our apartment, it was reflected in the neighborhood.

I learned about gentrification, community and the fights of independent business owners. I learned about the club scene, the drugs, the seedy underbelly of NYC and how to not get murdered.

The Chelsea, my neighborhood and the years of radical change I witnessed have shaped me into who I am, who I will be, and the lessons I will give my future kids. It was an inspirational and limitless way to grow up.

I was born in Cape Town, South Africa. I claim that, and I claim being a New Yorker.

“I grew up in the Chelsea Hotel” is not so weird to explain to people now. So maybe I’m the only person ever yelling out “CHELSEA!!!” in response to, “Where you from?” at rap shows. That’s okay. I’m proud of it and always will be.

A version of this article appeared in The Daily Note, a free daily newspaper distributed in New York during the 2013 Red Bull Music Academy.