【56】A City’s Theater @ Pittsburgh Public Theater, Cultural District

Do you know that Pittsburgh owns one of the five largest Downtown Theater Districts in the U.S.? I didn’t know this until trying to write something interesting and worthwhile for this post. But I guess it doesn’t matter that much whether it is the largest or not, what matters is that it has good shows for people to enjoy, simply to have a good time.

Since finishing the intense graduate school, I have been to the Public Theater multiple times courtesy of my +GlobalPittsburgh membership benefits. One show I attended was TRUE WEST, through which two battling brothers tried to hunt for those good memories of the west, the originality, the disappearing social geographic culture, and a sense of self-existence. Really liked it. Matt was not able to attend. I tried to donate the ticket to somebody else. But by the time the show started the seat next to me was still empty and I knew the staff at the Theater didn’t have enough time to find anybody to use the ticket. I really wish I would have more time to give the spare ticket away to somebody on the street who might have had the time to stop by and enjoy such a show that can simply take you away, far, far away from the mundane world to an artistic being, even just for two hours.

Since I have moved out of the city and started to commute to work after graduation, attending evening events after work can be challenging sometime. So I found another way of enjoying the City, by sharing the opportunities with other people.

That is what exactly happened and I found great pleasure out of it. Tickets for another two shows (SONDHEIM COMPANY-A MUSICAL COMEDY & NOISES OFF)were shared with two young couples. One couple is a Computer Science major Chinese visiting scholar at Carnegie Mellon University and his wife, who is now hired by Idea Foundry working in Beijing to promote Pittsburgh and Pennsylvania; and the other couple is anAsian-American engineer and his Kosovo girlfriend, who is now pursuing her MBA at Duquesne University and has landed a full-time position at Ernst & Young.

I believe when happiness and experience are shared, they are amplified, then they have  bigger presences that are long-er-lasting. I wish our Theater District and our City can be"broken"into pieces that everybody can carry a piece that is meaningful to them away. Carrying the broken piece away by individual theater-goers (regulars or one-time goers) is actually the essence of making the theater district/city whole and vivid again.  I truly believe that.

Beer winning trivia @ Pittsburgh Public Theater, Cultural District

1. Pittsburgh Public Theater was founded by Joan Apt, Margaret Rieck and Ben Shaktman and chartered in 1974 and opened in September 1975. When Pittsburgh enjoyed its industrial prosperity before 1960s, it was once a major stop of Pre-Broadway circuit. When three major theaters started to close--Old Nixon, New Nixon, and Pittsburgh Playhouse, only smaller community, college, and university theaters were keeping the art form alive, Pittsburgh suffered for a decade, in which the city had become known nationally as an unenthusiastic theater town. The foundation of Pittsburgh Public Theater really saved the City’s culture stance in the nation.

The first home (1975-1999) of the Public Theater was the Hazlett Theater on the North Side. The theater was housed in the Carnegie Free Library and Music Hall, a historic Richardson Romanesque landmark that survived the razing of many of the North Side's most impressive buildings. Three successful inauguration shows in 1975 set up the Public Theater for a good start. The Glass Menagerie; One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest; and Twelfth Night.

The +Pittsburgh Public Theater moved to its current home: O’Reilly Theater, in the heart of Downtown Cultural District. O’Reilly Theater is one of the few U.S. theaters built from the ground up in the last decade. It is a $20 million project of The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, with world-renown architect Michael Graves served as its principal architect.  The opening show of the Public Theater at its new home was August Wilson’s King Hedley II in December 1999.

2. Cultural District is a fourteen-square block area bordered by the Allegheny River on the north, Tenth Street on the east, Stanwix Street on the west, and Liberty Avenue on the south.

The Cultural District features six theaters offering some 1,500 shows annually, as well as art galleries, restaurants, and retail shops. (This Wiki Page about Pittsburgh Cultural District is very Informative and FUN to read.)

ID@Cultural District

How many Theaters are there in this picture? and how many theaters in total in the district?

【48】Life is DIVERTIDO, Everyday is a gift @ Divertido, Lawrenceville

In lawrenceville, a store called Divertido on Butler street caught my eye the first time I was taking a lunch walk back in September 2013. It has a very warm outdoor color theme, Orange. and a very catchy window display, tasteful and welcoming.

After the first encounter, I walked by the store many times and each time my eyes would find their ways to be glued to the window, my spirits would be lighted up, and then I thought how wonderful to be here at this moment.

One day the temptation was so irresistible that I opened the door and was greeted by a bright “Hello!”, later I found myself had opened up a whole new experience and greeted by an artistic Pittsburgh woman, Mary Ellen.

On the 22nd of January 2014, Mary Ellen and I sat down in her beautiful store and she told me a story about the birth and growth of Divertido, the store that was created and nurtured by her in the past ten years, for everybody who walks into the door to be able to have a fun experience of picking up a suitable gift for their loved ones.

Our conversation was interrupted several times by her customers. Each time, Mary Ellen would greet the customer, start a small chat and recommend some gifts that she thinks the person might like, just to make the customer at home. The customers were so happy and said they just wanted to walk around to kill time. In the end, when they left the store, they always got something for somebody in their family.

Whenever Mary Ellen was with her customers, I would walk around the store, take every color in, and felt so delighted because I so truly felt the passion and enthusiasm from Mary Ellen. It’s amazing how she has preserved and nurtured the passion she possessed 10 years ago when she first opened the store in another location on Butler street, when she decided to live each of her day fully with love, curiosity  and appreciation in 2006 after going through a health crisis, when in 2011 the original store was flooded and she had to find a new place to reopen the business, and when each time she goes out to look for products for her store among local artists as well as those nationwide or worldwide.

Then when she told me that her plan for Divertido is to leverage the online business trend to expand its market outside Pittsburgh in the future so that  more people can find the fun in picking a good gift for their loved ones, I knew it’s loving what she does and believing in the Divertido concept of shopping for gifts that has helped her achieve what she has achieved. Currently, Mary Ellen is also focusing on her website, and some social media channels to construct an user-friendly online presence. And her personal wish is to go to Paris someday.

If you have an opportunity to visit the store, you would know Mary Ellen’s store is the summation of her artistic background in music, photography, and sincere appreciation of art in general. It can also tell her deep understanding and appreciation of life’s many offerings. I always believe that life happens in sequence, the more we experience, the more we harvest. She herself as a person, an entrepreneur, has an abundant experience in our City and outside our City, which I believe made it even more interesting to know her as a person.  

She currently lives in Etna with her Mother, who remains a vivacious character and loves life much. She told me she was born in Etna when it was still a prosperous place and left for outside world to have a life, after she moved back to Pittsburgh in late 1980s, she has lived in many neighborhoods, such as Northside, Regent Square, and Squirrel Hill. While she felt those ups and downs of the city, she harbors a hope for our City to embrace a bright future, especially for her hometown Etna, a vibrant comeback.

Divertido is a bright spot in Mary Ellen’s life. It adds a bright color on Butler street for Lawrenceville, Pittsburgh. It lights up my spirits each time I think of it. When I purchased a pair of earrings from the store, I know, I have supported a local Pittsburgh artist named Jabari Mason.

At the end of our conversation, I asked Mary Ellen to use her own word to describe Pittsburgh. She thought about it for a long while and said, “I would say Pittsburgh is a Friendly city where you can always find a surprise that you can’t resist.” I think that is such a proper summary for her lovely store Divertido as well.

ID @ Divertido

Where is Divertido store in Lawrenceville?

What’s the color of the front desk? Do you see a door at the front desk too?

【36】Strut your tattoo proudly @David L. Lawrence Convention Center

10 days after starting my service year position as an Americorps VISTA working in HandsOn Tech program, I found myself seeking advice in Frank’s office on 500 Grant street. I have always been an enthusiastic student to take on many ideas and responsibilities, I want to do the same in my career. However, this is the first time I actually work full-time, let alone in an environment that I only had two years of experience and understanding. So just to be sure that I am doing the “right” thing to blend in my work environment while becoming a better professional, Frank naturally becomes my advisor as I mentioned already in a previous post Internship and beyond that he is a guardian.

So I popped in his office and had a constructive conversation with him. Towards the end of the meeting, he shared some information about a Tattoo convention that was taking place in David Lawrence, Convention Center, couple blocks away. I was very much intrigued and asked whether I could go or not. He was too nice to reject my proposal. So off we went together to the convention.

They are artists! All those tattoo works, along with the way they were presented, are just different forms of art. Not more and not less. Just like music, some people may like classic, while others like country or rock. Although I am not a big fan of "Ink art" and remain conservative about tattoos due to my traditional Chinese upbringing, I found myself admire the artists’ intricate tattoo designs, passionate nature about what they do, and the amiable characters that may be camouflaged under their flamboyant tattoos that might be sometime perceived as scary.

Talked to several artists. Except for a few local artists, the majority were from all over the country. Without compensations, they used their own money and invested their own time to travel hundreds of miles to Pittsburgh so that they could be present at this event and show visitors what they have to offer and to meet other like-minded people. When they were asked about their experience in Pittsburgh, they seemed to be satisfied about our city and what it offers, and promised would visit some sights after finishing their exhibit at the convention before they headed back.

Beer winning trivia @ Tattoo, David L. Lawrence Convention Center

1. The modern revival in tattooing stems from the voyage of British explorer Captain James Cook in the late 1700s. However, tattooing has been practiced for centuries in many cultures and spread throughout the world. The Ainu, an indigenous people of  Japan, traditionally had facial tattoos, as did the Australians. Today, one can find Atayal, Seediq, Truku, and Saisiyat of Taiwan, Berbers of Tamazgha (North Africa), Yoruba, Fulani and Hausa people of Nigeria, and Māori of New Zealand with facial tattoos. Tattooing was popular among certain ethnic groups in southern China, Polynesia, Africa, Borneo, Cambodia, Europe, Japan, the Mentawai Island, MesoAmerica,  New Zealand, North America and South America, the Philippines, and Taiwan.

Today, tattoos had negative connotations in historical China, where criminals oftentimes had been marked by tattooing and tattoos have remained a taboo in Chinese society. The Government of Meiji Japan had outlawed tattoos in the 19th century, a prohibition that stood for 70 years before being repealed in 1948. As of June 6, 2012 all new tattoos are forbidden for employees of the city of Osaka. Existing tattoos are required to be covered with proper clothing. The regulations were added to Osaka's ethical codes, and employees with tattoos were encouraged to have them removed. This was done because the strong connection of tattoos with the Yakuza, or Japanese organized crime, after an Osaka official in February 2012 threatened a schoolchild by showing his tattoo.  

Current cultural understandings of tattoos in Europe and North America have been greatly influenced by long-standing stereotypes based on deviant social groups in the 19th and 20th centuries. Particularly in North America tattoos have been associated with stereotypes, folklore, and racism. Not until the 1960s and 1970s did people associate tattoos with such societal outcasts as bikers and prisoners.

2.  The initial David L. Lawrence Convention Center was completed on the site on February 7, 1981, but as part of a renewal plan the new, completely redesigned center was opened in 2003 and funded in conjunction with nearby Heinz Field and PNC Park. It sits on the southern shoreline of the Allegheny River. It is the first LEED-certified convention center in North America and one of the first in the world. It is owned by the Sports & Exhibition Authority of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County.

The convention center was named after  David Leo Lawrence (June 18, 1889 – November 21, 1966). He is also to date the only mayor of Pittsburgh to be elected the 37th Governor of Pennsylvania (1959-1963). He was Pennsylvania's first  Catholic Governor. During his four-year term as governor, he passed anti-discrimination legislation, environmental protection laws, expanded Pennsylvania's library system, passed Pennsylvania's fair housing law, and advocated historic preservation. He also passed vigorous highway safety legislation, a move some attribute to the fact that two of his sons were killed in an automobile accident. His expansion of state bureaucracies came at the price of budget deficits and tax increases, a move that angered many fiscal conservatives.  

Previously, he had been the longest tenured mayor of  Pittsburgh from 1946 through 1959, who was the primary force behind Pittsburgh's urban renewal projects including the Mellon Arena, Gateway Center, Fort Pitt Tunnel and Point State Park. Lawrence fell ill and collapsed at a campaign rally held at Pittsburgh's Syria Mosque for gubernatorial candidate Milton Shapp on November 4, 1966. He died 17 days later having never regained consciousness, at the age of 77. He is buried in Pittsburgh's Calvary Cemetery at 718 Hazelwood Avenue in the Greenfield and Hazelwoods.

Your ID @ Tattoo Convention

1. What’s the name of the Tattoo Convention that was held on September 13th-14th 2013 in Pittsburgh?