North Clarke Street

Memories of my wanderings in Chicago came up today (after mulling over an extemporaneous conversation I had with a chatty, likable Irani restaurant owner, in which he says that Punekar Brahmins are leaving in droves for the US of A). The context of our conversation was something different altogether.
This street of Chicago is a menagerie of people from different ethnicities and cultures. The particular street I'm talking about is the one which goes by the Wrigley stadium.
You have quaint old bookshops, small cozy pubs, yoga classes, comic book stores and much more. I guess it's true that any place is made lively by the people that inhabit it. This is true of Chicago, one of the most cosmopolitan centers of the world.
It's interesting how different places across the globe are witness to a dramatic flux of cultures.
To quote from this article by Benoy. K. Behl: "...People of different countries rubbed shoulders with each other in its marketplaces. Portuguese merchants brought the best horses from Arabia, diamonds came from Golconda, and textiles and spices flowed in from all corners of the world. It was one of the most thriving and cosmopolitan places in the world..."
The flavor of this cultural flux is quite unique though, as it emanates from the belly button of the world's economic and political super-bully...