jeudi 20 novembre 2008

Le vent nouveau qui souffle sur Chicago

Je ne cesse de vanter les mérites de Chicago depuis deux ans, soit depuis la première fois que j'ai découvert la ville des vents.

Le New York Times vient de publier un excellent article qui aborde le vent de changement qui souffle sur la ville. Évidemment, l'élection d'Obama y est pour beaucoup. Si vous lisez l'anglais, allez-y, ça vaut la peine.

Parmi les meilleurs moments de l'article:

Yet this moment of renaissance for Chicago is about much more than architecture and athletics. For the first time in the country’s history, an American president will call this city home. And as he moves to Washington, a dose of the Chicago mood is sure to follow.

...

The complexity of Chicago, a city that is multiplying in its new diversity even as it clings to a segregated past, is rooted in the 200 neighborhoods that make up the nation’s third-largest city. America may well know Oprah Winfrey, who became a billion-dollar name through her rise to fame here, but the city holds a far broader identity.

One sign that the Obama brand is replacing the Oprah brand? The talk show tycoon is not mentioned in the city’s new tourism campaign, which invites visitors to “Experience the city the Obamas enjoy.” Ms. Winfrey’s studio is not mentioned along the list of stops, which range from Mr. Bayless’s restaurants to a bookstore in the Obamas’ Hyde Park neighborhood to Promontory Point along Lake Michigan. And souvenirs are on sale across town, with Obama shirts, hats and knickknacks arriving just in time for holiday shopping.

...

Jeff Tweedy, the leader of the band Wilco who grew up in downstate Illinois and lives in Chicago, said the city never felt the inferiority complex that outsiders spend so much time musing about. Still, he said, the election of Mr. Obama, a friend for years, has given an unusual boost of confidence in a city that is usually nonplussed.

“I think people really do enjoy the idea that we’re living in the center of the world all of the sudden,” Mr. Tweedy said. “There have been all these prevailing stereotypes, and people don’t know how big and urban Chicago actually is. People think of it as being in a cornfield.”

1 commentaire:

Unknown a dit…

Exactement. Les gens pensent jamais à Chicago pour la visite d'une grosse ville américaine ou même une destination-vacances, et pourtant...

Moi, je le sais depuis 2005!