I went to New York with my sister, and we took a bus. And it turned out to be the most New York thing ever.
He sits at the front of the bus—New York–Italian, disheveled, looking fifty in the eye and not liking it. Like Al Pacino in a cheap anorak. Al Pac-a-Mac-ino.
He’s holding a microphone in his hand, and sighing heavily. He is our tour guide on this open-topped bus ride around Manhattan, $27.
“I gotta tell you, sweetheart—I’m only going to be operating on a third of my usual powers today,” he says, pausing by my seat. He has taken a shine to me and my sister. We have no idea why. “This crowd here—they’re not gonna get it. They’re not gonna get it, London.”
His tired hand gesture takes in the big Pakistani family, a couple from Austria, a woman in a burka, a couple from St. Lucia. A single, prim-looking Korean woman.
He sighs. “I can tell. It’s gonna be a waste. Today, London, I’m dialing in Roberto Baddacelli.”
He is Roberto Baddacelli. He might be the worst tour guide in Manhattan.
Generally, I am a fan of the “bad tour guide” genre. We once had a tour guide in Athens who began his walk around the Parthenon with “I hate the English. Hate the English”—a bold statement even when uttered to a large, internationally mixed crowd but twice as exciting given that he was speaking to a group that consisted of only me and my husband, who are English.
But Baddacelli might be even better than him.
“The picture’s THERE! The picture’s THERE!” he shouts, as we go past the Flatiron Building. “LEFT LEFT LEFT, TAKE IT NOW! ST. LUCIA, TAKE YOUR PICTURE! LONDON! TAKE YOUR PICTURE! NOW! JESUS CHRIST!”
Apparently, I am “London.” He tells a joke. It’s about Hitler. The couple from Austria don’t look happy. And they haven’t even seen the storm yet. As we go across the Brooklyn Bridge, the Manhattan skyline is wearing a massive bouff of black cloud, cracked with lightning. Baddacelli looks personally angry about that weather.
“Everybody, everybody—thanks very much for hauling me out here during a thunderstorm. I really appreciate it,” he says.
The woman from Pakistan is worried. She has three children.
“What will happen?” she asks, in pieced-together English.
“We’re in a tin can going over the Brooklyn Bridge—what do you think will happen, Pakistan? PULL OVER!”
He bangs on the side of the bus, to alert the driver.
“I know a guy who got KILLED this way. STRUCK BY LIGHTNING!” he tells the bus—just as the sky cracks open and everyone is instantly, violently soaked. In less than three minutes, the floor is four inches deep in water. This is monsoon.
Baddacelli climbs down the central aisle passing out yellow plastic rain ponchos—trying to keep his shoes out of the water by climbing on the edges of the seats. As he passes us, he goes, “Jesus Christ, London. Jesus Christ.”
We disembark in Chinatown and stand under scaffolding for half an hour, watching the lightning lance the sky. It passes slowly. By the time it’s safe to get back on the bus, it’s gone nine p.m. The bus starts up.
“We’re off route now,” Roberto shouts into the microphone, against the gale. “OFF ROUTE. Because of the storm. So—who wants to go to Ground Zero?”
I’m pretty sure none of these cold, wet, late people want to go to Ground Zero—site of the twenty-first century’s worst peacetime atrocity. But the thing about a bus full of people swathed head to toe in yellow-hooded rain ponchos is that it is unlikely you will be able to take an accurate reading of their mood when asking a question in a language they don’t understand.
We circle Ground Zero, at ten p.m., in the rain.
“THAT’S THE PICTURE, THAT’S THE PICTURE! ON THE LEFT! ON THE LEFT, AUSTRIA!” he says. “That was just an EMPTY SOCKET IN THE GROUND ten years ago. The whole of this block was on FIRE. It BURNED, God rest their souls.”
He notes the mood is somber, and tries to lighten it.
“Hey! You know what I drink since they killed Osama Bin Laden? You know what I drink? Two shots and a splash! TWO SHOTS AND A SPLASH! Get it? Get it, London?”
We’re going through downtown now—building after building of sheer, vertical black glass. This part of Manhattan is like a money tunnel, a funnel of souls towards Macy’s. This is Gotham.
“This is where I was born,” Roberto says, sitting at the back of the bus. After no one laughed at his joke, he suddenly looked defeated. He holds the microphone in the same way someone suicidal toys with a gun.
“This used to be all red-brick walk-ups. That was real New York. This new stuff, it just looks—morbid. Like some gloomy Tim Burton movie. I miss the brick walk-ups.”
The bus reaches its stop. A line of yellow-caped passengers exit the bus, shivering. Baddacelli sits at the back of the bus, not moving.
As we walk past, he says: “I just miss the brick walk-ups, England.”