Countess’s travel travails
To The Editor:
Re “Trump double trouble; N.Y.U. roiled by crackdowns” (news article, March 9):
This deportation and banning of respectable, good, hard-working people who contribute to American culture has now been going on for years. Trump just made it a front-and-center issue. This year’s Acker Awards highlighted the struggle of Alex Zapak.
An excerpt from Anthony Haden-Guest’s statement in the Acker booklet: “Welcome to L.A. Alex Zapak, universally a.k.a. The Countess, on her way home from London, at last reached the end of the passport line. Uh-Oh! She had overstayed her Canadian visa by 16 days. She was put in a special line… .
“ ‘But it didn’t cross my mind that I had a problem until I had to get into a van and go to another part of the airport. My phone was confiscated. I was put in a room. The air conditioning was on and it was freezing. They didn’t see me until about midnight.’
“ ‘An agent questioned me.’ ‘How are you making money?’ She said she had a small income.
“ ‘Why did she travel so much? Why the move to New Orleans? And L.A.?’ ‘I said I had left New York because my heart was broken. I was writing and meeting musicians. Then I went to L.A. to get the sound on my movie done and ended up staying.’
“The agent pounced: So she was working? ‘I said, no. That’s what artists do. It’s not work. I’m no getting paid for it.’
The Countess was put on a London plane. Banned from re-entry to the U.S. for five years. It is now seven years and she is still not allowed in… .
This is what fascism looks like and is very anti-American. Immigrants built America. Trump’s ancestors are not Native Americans.
N.Y.U. sounds gutless. They want the money students bring. They want to expand the billion-dollar real-estate empire. But they do not support those who are bringing in the money.
Clayton Patterson
Bicycle Bolsheviks
To The Editor:
Re “What the L? TransAlt vol is accused of not ID’ing self at forum” (news article, March 9):
Transportation Alternatives was once a thoughtful voice in the wilderness against moribund policies of the Department of Transportation and New York Police Department. But they have essentially become a crazed bunch of bicycle Bolsheviks from Brooklyn who are hell-bent on Disneyfying the gritty streets of the city.
Carl Rosenstein
Use some horse sense!
To The Editor:
People who wear Canada Goose coats are either ignorant or uncaring about the extreme animal cruelty involved. It doesn’t bother them that coyotes are trapped and skinned for their fur to trim the jacket hoods — an unnecessary vanity — and many more geese and ducks are killed to provide their soft, puffy under-feathers — the “goose down.”
They believe they have a right to use animals in any way for their own benefit — an age-old argument. Some of us have evolved and some haven’t.
But what I am most mystified about is how so many people — millennials, mostly — buy this super-expensive coat for upward of $1,000 — many probably maxing out their credit cards. Men and women alike — all marching to the same beat, with odd arm patches on their uniforms, making them look like they are part of some secret army on their way to a meeting.
The coat is boxy with unflattering lines. But it is a status symbol for those who feel the need to fit in due to insecurity, to look like the next person, and to let strangers know that they were able to pay big bucks for their ugly coat. It is most definitely not about warmth since many cruelty-free coats are equally as warm, plus more attractive and less costly. Most ski clothes do not even use down or fur. There is a sucker born every minute. But it is disconcerting that so many younger people do not have an ounce of individuality or creativity and feel the desperate need to belong by joining this odd club.
Elizabeth Forel
Forel is president and co-founder, Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages
E-mail letters, not longer than 250 words in length, to news@thevillager.com or fax to 212-229-2790 or mail to The Villager, Letters to the Editor, 1 MetroTech North, 10th floor, Brooklyn, NY 11201. Please include phone number for confirmation purposes. The Villager reserves the right to edit letters for space, grammar, clarity and libel. Anonymous letters will not be published.
