As I was walking down Lafayette street in SoHo toward the Village, I overheard a daughter trying to brush aside her overbearing mother. I could hear the Jersey accent…or was it Long Island…one of wealth and prosperity…the kind that would flag down a taxi so that their shoes wouldn’t break from a walk of three blocks.

I stopped by a popular store along the way. Kid Robot. I immediately recognized everything that they sold—similar to a store I loitered at in the Haight-Ashbury. I hopped out of the store and continue browsing nearby stores, passing hipsters and tourists. My hands were freezing, as the wind blew angrily. I stopped by a coffee store and tea…the smell was engulfing—designed to overwhelm the senses into buying a single $5 latte.

Then I arrived at my destination—a specialty artisan gelato store. The furniture was hip and sparse. Utilitarian with bright colors. A mixture of Italian was used for the flavor names and I tasted several flavors in the empty shop.

As I sat down with my $5 small cup of gelato…it suddenly struck me.

How is this any different from San Francisco? Like the time I would hastily sit down in the park gobbling yet another $5 cone of ice cream?