by Whalehead King

Created on: January 25, 2009

Here's what locals do in Boston: they make their neighborhoods lively. This is a city with a throbbing pulse. It is lived-in and dense and vibrating with errands and routines and traditions. It is a city of neighborhoods and sub-neighborhoods, of parishes and squares set within the larger jurisdictions. You can get the bird's eye view from the sky wald atop of the Prudential Center, or you can get the pedestrian's experience on the sidewalk.

Tourists visit the attractions and take the tours, and Bostonians often cross paths with them. The locals are going about their own business however, providing the backdrops that make the city so interesting to visitors. You can go anywhere in Boston and fit in. It is a city of immigrants. Its population swells with people who aren't from around here, so don't be ashamed of your accent. You'll blend in fine. The main municipal divisions are Boston, South Boston, East Boston, Charlestown, Dorchester, Roxbury, Hyde Park, West Roxbury, Allston and Brighton. There are many, many subdivisions within this patchwork but all of them are Boston and each of them has its own flavor. A city is an organism made of many parts. Boston is a bewildering collection of folkways and ethnicities and specialties. Most tourists keep to Boston proper as described in brochures. That is well and good, but a much larger city isn't serviced by tour guides. Self-guided tours offer the most special delights.

You may have heard about Boston's crime rate. Fear not. No one who lives here does. You can go anywhere in this great city and leave unmolested. You can see things no one outside the fringes imagines and be better for it. A city so old and thick and rich with history hides delights around almost every corner. One of five surviving colonial governor's mansions is preserved on a hillside in an industrial neighborhood in Roxbury. Roxbury Heights is home to a water tower that resembles Cinderella's castle. You can ride a 1940s era, one-car trolley through a cemetery, the only mass transit train in America to do so, along with people who make this commute twice a weekday. You can walk amid hulking Victorian chocolate factories and get some soul food or Thai food or stop into a dark, Irish pub all within a block or two.

No matter where you go in Boston, you'll enjoy yourself. The locals do. They get along and bend elbows while bending each other's ears. This is as much a talking city as it is a walking city. It is a city full of people interested in each other, chewing the chowder and passing the time, buying the next round, always happy to hear a new point-of-view.

I'm not going to recommend anywhere in particular because anywhere you go, you'll find comraderie in an urban playscape that sets your imagination free. Take a train or a bus or your shoe leather anywhere in Boston and you won't be disappointed. This is what the locals do. They wander their city, take its measure, and make the most of it. Stop randomly at any place that catches your eye, there will be plenty of them, and get acquainted. Like a Bostonian, you won't be disappointed at all this great city has to offer. There are all sorts of corner grocers and cheese shops and bakeries. There are media outlets and gift emporia that cater to specific clientel. There are more varieties of pizza than anyone can catagorize as well as soups and pastas and even candy bars and potato chips. Wherever you go in Boston, it is unique. A random encounter can show you the city. That is how the people who live here live their lives. They set a good example of how to experience Boston.

Learn more about this author, Whalehead King.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.