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When I lived there, they found a warehouse full of dead Asian girls who thought they were being brought over to work in the garment industry but were instead being held as sex slaves and then left to die when the boss got killed. I only lasted a couple months down there.
I lived in the broom closet of a dressmaker's loft/ sweatshop. The dressmaker was a terrible witch who was sour that her dresses, which had enjoyed a flash-in-the-pan celebrity status for about two seconds when Cher bought one, never did that well. They were made all out of feathers.
Convinced that I was wasting my youth writing at my desk each evening, she forced me out one night. So I walked around the corner to the local bar and let three strange men buy me drinks for the first and only time in my life. Different mixed drinks -- three or four -- and I knew I was going to be sick, so I got up to leave, then promptly threw up all over my Loden wool coat. It was bitter cold out so I didn't want to stand still, plus I was too embarrassed to admit that I was puking, so I just kept walking. Of course, in the morning I had to take that only coat of mine into the cleaners and waste 20 bucks having it cleaned which meant I had no money for food the next week.
I grew so weak that one morning, on the way down the stairs, I twisted my ankle badly and when I got outside on the street, I fainted. A truck driver got out of his rig and helped me up, then some of the dressmaker's illegal sweatshop ladies helped me back inside. The witch took pity on me, made me toast -- my boss found out (my face was pretty bruised) -- gave me a raise, and the next month, I moved up to the West Village to a much nicer sublet where I was on my own.
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