Coworkers and friends scoffed at our plans for a weekend trip to Buffalo. So did the friendly residents of Buffalo who couldn’t fathom why we were there. Living in Pittsburgh, we’re used to this dismissive attitude, and we didn’t let it slow us down.
We weren’t in Buffalo to see the eerily empty downtown, cop cars blockading the street, gusts of wind over the half-frozen Lake Erie marina, or the desolate cobblestone district. But that’s how our Saturday started out. Next up on our list of attractions – the Broadway Market – which caused our innkeeper to cringe and express her hope that the market would turn around some day (implying it hadn’t yet.) This feeling was reinforced by the endless stretch of Broadway Avenue lined with vacant lots and soon-to-be-demolished buildings. Driving up the narrow ramp to the dank and mostly empty (but free) parking garage, we realized our impressions of Buffalo hinged on the state of the Broadway Market. Half the booths are unoccupied and most of them are unvisited. But right as you step off the escalator, an old Polish lady thrusts a saltine into your hand and coats it with a deadly concoction of tear-inducing horseradish and bright purple beets. Warning: Do not eat this in one bite, though Adam complains he did not get this warning.
We settle into stools at the Polish bakery counter to munch on their homemade pierogies and people-watch. A stream of regulars order coffee or tea at $1 a cup and join us in the people-watching. Elsewhere in the market, a Mardis Gras band is playing, men are conversing loudly in Polish, and the line at the soul food counter is over 10 people long.
The tourism brochure probably highlights the authentic Polish pottery, samples from multiple vintners, fresh-roasted coffee beans, and kitschy Buffalo souvenirs. Other city brochures highlight the monumental art-deco city hall, trendy bars and restaurants along Elmwood Avenue, the eclectic art scene, and boulevards lined with Victorian mansions. But Broadway Market is in a very shady neighborhood, and city hall is caked in dirt. Police cameras keep watch over intersections in even the most bustling areas of town, and the mansions are more likely to be crumbling sub-divided apartments as opulent renovated single-family homes. Buffalo may be on an upswing, but it has a long ways to go.
In the meantime, enjoy what’s there, and what’s there is probably more than you are expecting.
* This is the first of our four-part series of our under-appreciated US cities tour. Next up, Cincinnati…or Milwaukee. Why either of those places? We honestly don’t know.
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