Not exactly an art gallery...

Last semester I had this ridiculously amazing professor of urban ecology and sociology. He would often regale us with tales of his debauchery...and by debauchery what I mean is "accidently" catching drug deals on camera, then having to scale fences to escape the overlords as they chased him around the streets of the Bronx.

I'm sure he was only exaggerating a little bit.

At any rate, in a similar fashion, when Jo and I had to go to the Gallery (inner city Philadelphia, for those who aren't familar with the terminology) for some debaunchery of our own, I decided to hang out the car window snapping pictures of various incidents of urban disorder and decay. Broken windows theory, anyone? I'm sure that I'll use these somewhere along the way in a paper or presentation, and I'm sure that I came damn close to getting shot to get some of these so I thought I'd share them here, such an obvious forum for open discussion on justice theory.

Without further adieu, I give you the Gallery. Some of the pictures are a tad blurry. We were two white girls in an SUV in one of the worst areas in the country. Of course we were going 50 mph.

I love the BMW...parked next to a dirty sidewalk and a building with metal gates over the doors.
The further into the ghetto you go, the bigger percentage they take out of whatever check you're cashing. Incidently, there's also a disproportionately high number of fine establishments to buy chicken fried steak. Apparently it sells well with shrimp lo mein and gumbo.

By this time next year, I'll be able to read that writing and know exactly what it means. Undoubtedly it's a gangland turf war of some sorts.
I think the grey overcast says it all.

This was by far my favourite picture of the day. If memory serves, it was taken while speeding past one of those fine cuisine establishments I mentioned early, but I believe they specialized in a combination of Jamaican, Ethiopian and cheesesteaks.