After a walkabout on the Upper East Side, I stopped by the Downtown Uptown Café (which, incidentally has free wi-fi internet access) and ended up chatting with Viv.
AskaNewYorker: Hi, Viv. How’s it going? Do you live around here?
Viv: I live in Yorkville, in the East 80s.
AskaNewYorker: Tell us about your neighborhood.
Viv: It’s nice. I moved here originally because I had a commute to White Plains and it was convenient for the 4-5-6 subway line. But then, I got a rent stabilized apartment and I’m basically stuck here for the rest of my life. But, it’s a nice neighborhood to live in. It’s not really a very fun neighborhood to go out at night in, but I like living here anyway.
AskaNewYorker: Do you have any pets?
Viv: No. I’m against having pets in the city. I think it’s kind of mean. There just isn’t enough space. If you are lucky enough to have a back yard, that’s a different story. But if you’re just cooped up in an apartment all day, I don’t know, I’m personally opposed.
AskaNewYorker: Are you a vegetarian? I’m not trying to say that there might be a connection between being a vegetarian and being opposed to pet ownership in New York City!
Viv: No, I eat everything. Everything under the sun.
AskaNewYorker: Did you go to school in the city?
Viv: No, I went to Harvard, and I moved here after.
AskaNewYorker: What did you study?
Viv: Biology. I’m doing absolutely nothing with my degree, proudly. But, I’m from upstate New York, and I’ve been here in the city since 2001.
AskaNewYorker: What do you do now, if you’re not using that biology degree?
Viv: I run Viv’s Guide. (www.vivsguide.com)
AskaNewYorker: Full time?
Viv: Yes.
AskaNewYorker: What is it?
Viv: It’s a dining guide for cheap eats in Manhattan. We started as a website. We’re also a dining club, for people to get together twice a month and eat out, only cheap eats. We also have a book out, which is called Viv’s Guide, an Undercover Look at the City’s Cheap Eats. http://www.vivsguide.com/buy_book.php
AskaNewYorker: That sounds really cool. What would you recommend in this neighborhood for cheap eats?
Viv: My favorite would have to be Pio Pio at 1746 First Ave around 90th St. It’s a Peruvian chicken place. You can get a whole chicken for about $10. It’s really good chicken, all marinated, incredibly juicy, and it comes with this green sauce that’s just so good, it will kill you. It’s amazing. Awesome. Hot, but not too hot. Just perfect. It’s a nice little place. It’s not a hole-in-the-wall.
AskaNewYorker: Do you like to cook?
Viv: I never cook. That’s why I’m a cheap eater. My kitchen is about 5 feet wide in my apartment, so it’s just not happening.
AskaNewYorker: Tell me more about the origins of Viv’s Guide.
Viv: When I first moved to the city, I started keeping a list of restaurants that I heard about. I would jot down some notes when I heard about them. And over the years, I ended up accumulating quite a long list. It was a couple hundred restaurants long. I decided to feed it into a database and put it up online, and invited people to use it. This is how the dining club portion of Viv’s Guide really got started. Originally you had to join the club and then you could see this free data base. During the first two weeks like 100 people ended up joining the club to get the database, which I thought was incredible. At that point, I was looking for something to do with myself, and I thought it would be fun to turn this all into a real guide. I brought on a bunch of researchers who ran around for several months and tried all these restaurants and wrote them up.
AskaNewYorker: That’s great! We get a lot of questions at Ask a New Yorker from new-comers looking for ways to meet people. This would not only be a good place to meet people, but to get acquainted with their new home, too. Was the food at Harvard any good?
Viv: College food. I don’t think it was any better or worse than any other college food. But, it was nice that everyone there ate in the dining hall. It was a great community feeling.
AskaNewYorker: Do you play poker?
Viv: I actually had a poker night last night. I have the world’s most unprofessional poker club. We don’t play for money. We have a chip welfare system in place. If you run out of chips, everybody else will kick in and give you more. It basically dissolves into a discussion on economic policy by the end of the evening, every time.
AskaNewYorker: So what are you doing tonight?
Viv: I actually have a dinner tonight for my dining club for Cheap Eats. We’re going to a Malaysian restaurant in Little Italy called Nyonya (194 Grand St).
AskaNewYorker: A Malaysian restaurant in Little Italy, I love it! Enjoy!
