creativity

Sunken Suppers & Coastal Secrets: Uncovering NYC’s Maritime Food History for Climate Week NYC

Christa Avampato
Fraunces Tavern in NYC. Photo by Christa Avampato.

When global leaders, researchers, climate advocates, scientists, and business managers gather across New York City for Climate Week NYC 2026 next week, the conversations will often hover at 30,000 feet. We will hear about carbon offsets, macroeconomic shifts, and international energy policy, as well as companies talking (often in broad strokes) about their actions and programs.

Those high-level summits matter. Yet climate resilience does not start in a boardroom—it lives under our feet, in the streets we navigate daily, and along the shorelines that shape our city.

Long before seawalls and modern bulkheads defined Lower Manhattan, this shoreline functioned as a dynamic, edible ecosystem. Oysters the size of dinner plates stabilized storm surges, tidal wetlands cushioned the coast, and maritime markets fed a growing metropolis straight from local waters and busy sidewalks. The street names we walk every day—Water Street, Pearl Street, Front Street—trace the literal history of how New Yorkers continually pushed soil into the harbor, reshaping the edges of New York’s islands while distancing ourselves from the natural systems that sustained us to make us the city we are today.

Next week, I’m hosting Sunken Suppers & Coastal Secrets: NYC’s Maritime Food History Walking Tour. It’s an official Climate Week NYC walking tour centered on food to trace those sunken histories and explore how our maritime past holds the keys to our climate future.

History as a Climate Compass

Looking at climate adaptation through the lens of history changes how we view resilience:

  • Rediscovering Living Infrastructure: Oysters and salt marshes were never just food sources; they were natural breakwaters. Rebuilding living shorelines today is not a new invention—it is a return to an ecological equilibrium that protected these New York islands for centuries.
  • Understanding What Lies Beneath: When we walk Lower Manhattan, we are standing on layers of ballast stones, discarded oyster shells, historic timber, and sunken treasure. Knowing how past generations transformed the coast helps us understand why these same neighborhoods flood today during severe storms.
  • Reconnecting Food to Place: A resilient city requires a resilient food web. Examining how New York historically fed itself from surrounding estuaries reveals the urgent need to protect regional waterways, support local fisheries and food-based businesses, and eliminate pollution in our waters, as well as our air and soil.

Join the Walk

We already have a great crowd who’s bought tickets, but a handful of spots remain for those who want to step out of the conference rooms and experience Climate Week NYC from the street level with me.

We will walk the historic paths of Lower Manhattan around the South Street Seaport, examine how colonial maritime trade shaped our physical geography, and discuss how community-driven ecological repair can protect our coastal neighborhoods like this one from rising tides and storms.

Whether you join in person or follow along from afar, reconnecting with the historical geography of your own neighborhood is one of the most powerful ways to ground climate action in reality.

The Togetherhood Takeaway

You don’t need to attend an international summit to build a climate mindset. You can start by observing how your own neighborhood interacts with the living world.

  • Find What Existed Before Modern Infrastructure: Look up historical topographic maps of your neighborhood (such as the Welikia Project for NYC) or check out exhibits at your local museums. Notice where streams, marshes, and natural shorelines once flowed beneath modern pavement. That historical geography often predicts where water pools during heavy downpours today and opens up our imaginations to what we may be able to restore so that all living beings thrive.
  • Support Nature Restoration: Back grassroots organizations working directly in your neighborhood. In NYC, we have quite a few including the Billion Oyster Project, local riverkeeper groups, and Natural Areas Conservancy. Restoring native habitats builds long-term natural buffers against storm damage and climate resiliency.
  • Walk with Curiosity: Take an hour this week to walk your neighborhood with fresh eyes. Notice where rainwater drains, how trees and vegetation exist alongside human-made infrastructure, and your wildlife neighbors.

Next week, I will be sharing a full recap from my walking tour, along with dispatches, field notes, and ideas gathered from events across Climate Week NYC that I’ve attended.

creativity

How our memories shape what we see

Christa Avampato
Wreath at 9/11 Memorial, NYC. Photo by Christa Avampato.

It’s my tradition to visit the 9/11 Memorial on September 12th to honor all of the challenges our city has faced every day since that tragic day. Though many people are always there, it often maintains a quiet that can be hard to find in that area of NYC. People put their hands on the names etched into the panels surrounding the pools of water flowing into the ground outlining the footprints of the 2 towers.

Last week, I read a piece where a teenager insightfully said he believes people who were alive during 9/11 look at that memorial and see something that’s no longer there, existing only in their memories. It’s such a true and beautiful observation.

I am always surprised when I go to that area now because it’s never how I imagine it. When I think of that area, I recall the many, many years it was an open pit with construction crews facing numerous hurdles while building the memorial and museum that honors everyone we lost and everyone impacted by 9/11. I worked at American Express for 4 years, and every day I walked over a footbridge that crossed that construction site. All of that is gone now, but it continues to live in my mind from those formative years of my career.

Every year, I’m reminded of how powerful memory is. How memory is often just as alive, if not more so, than what physically exists in the present. I think about how much these beloved people have missed. How much they are missed. How much they will always be missed. I think about how many people are still impacted by illnesses caused by that terrible day and the many days after. And how all of them, and all who love them, deserve justice and are still waiting for it.

Photos of the 9/11 Memorial, the Oculus, and the light beams symbolizing the towers blazing toward the sky last week from the roof of my apartment building in Brooklyn. Photos by Christa Avampato.

creativity

NYC’s Secrets & Lies Brings Underground Deception And Spooky Transit Lore To The New York Transit Museum This October

Christa Avampato
https://www.nytransitmuseum.org/program/secrets-and-lies/

And we’re back! NYC’s Secrets & Lies, my live storytelling show about secret NYC history, is celebrating Spooky Season by going underground with our new partner – New York Transit Museum in Downtown Brooklyn. Join us on Thursday, October 22 at 6:00 PM for a special Halloween edition of our show.

Set within the museum’s authentic 1936 decommissioned subway station, the interactive performance challenges audiences to untangle truth from chilling fiction in New York City’s past. Four master storytellers step up to the mic. Three will share shocking, true tales from New York transit history. One will deliver a bold lie. Listen closely, track the details, and cast your vote. Uncover the liar correctly, and you’ll be entered into the lottery to win a fantastic prize from the museum.

Tickets for NYC’s Secrets & Lies: Transit Tales are on sale now. $15 for the general admission and $10 for Transit Museum members: https://www.nytransitmuseum.org/program/secrets-and-lies/

Seating inside the museum is strictly limited. Claim your spot early before seats vanish!

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Created, produced, and hosted by licensed New York City tour guide and author Christa Avampato, NYC’s Secrets & Lies blends investigative history, competitive sleuthing, and live performance. The October 22 production features a curated lineup of master storytellers, including Dr. Edith Gonzalez, Vicki Eastus, Emily Olsen, and Jahtiek Long.

creativity

Reclaiming the Shore: How Flushing Creek is Healing from the Bottom Up

Christa Avampato
A shore clean up run by Guardians of Flushing Bay. Photo from Guardians of Flushing Bay.

For decades, the waters edging northern Queens, a borough in New York City where I’ve lived several times throughout my long history as a proud New Yorker, carried the forgotten weight of industrial disregard. Abandoned boats, half-sunken barges, rotting docks, and tangled metal debris choked Flushing Bay and Flushing Creek, turning a vital tidal waterway into an urban blight.

These vessels did far more than ruin the view. The boats leach motor oil, toxic antifouling paints, microplastics from decaying fiberglass, and heavy metals directly into the mud and water. They trap plastic waste, smother native marsh grasses, and block natural water flow, creating stagnant, low-oxygen conditions that choke out fish and marine life. For surrounding communities—largely working-class, immigrant-rich neighborhoods that have historically borne the brunt of environmental neglect—the shoreline became an obstacle as well as a health hazard.

Now, a major cleanup and removal effort spearheaded by local advocates and supported by federal funding led by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is finally clearing this neglected waterway from the bottom up.

Removing the Ghosts of Industry

Hauling decades-old derelict vessels out of shallow tidal water is meticulous, physical work. It requires specialized cranes, marine salvagers, environmental containment booms, and coordinated stewardship across federal, state, and local agencies. This web of cooperation is difficult to assemble and even harder to manage, and it is through the incredible efforts of organizations such as the Guardians of Flushing Bay, Riverkeeper, and the DEC, along with elected officials and the residents, that this is happening. The physical salvage work on the ground is being run directly by NYC Parks through their newly launched Office of Marine Debris Disposal and Vessel Surrendering, funded in partnership with NOAA and bolstered by Representative Ocasio-Cortez.

Each extracted hull delivers an immediate win for the local ecosystem:

  • Unlocking the Natural Tidal Circulation: Removing massive obstructions allows natural currents and tides to flush sediment and oxygenate the water, reversing chronic stagnation and literally bringing the waters back to life.
  • Stopping Chemical Leaks: Lifting out old fuel tanks and the vessels that have peeling lead paint along with chemically treated lumber removes continuous sources of toxicity that are poisoning this waterway and those who live there.
  • Restoring Shoreline Habitats: Clear mudflats and shorelines give native plants, sea life, and foraging shorebirds space to return and anchor natural coastal resilience.
  • Restoring Community Access: Clearing navigational hazards opens the water safely to human-powered boats, youth rowing programs, community science projects, and vital environmental research.

Ecological Health is Community Justice

A waterfront cleanup is never just about aesthetics. In a city where water surrounds us every day, access to clean, thriving shorelines is a core issue of equity and public health. A healthy waterfront also provides joy, curiosity, wonder, and positive experiences with nature.

When we leave waterways in working-class neighborhoods clogged with industrial trash, we send a subtle message about whose neighborhood deserves beauty and care. Reclaiming Flushing Creek and Flushing Bay proves that urban ecological repair and community dignity walk hand-in-hand. When dedicated neighbors, grassroots advocates, and elected leaders refuse to accept neglect, even our most damaged waterways can breathe again.

The Togetherhood Takeaway

Restoring our shared natural spaces begins with noticing the neglected corners of our neighborhoods and demanding better for the ecosystems that sustain us.

  • Support Local Waterway Advocates: Follow and support grassroots groups on the frontlines of NYC waters, such as Guardians of Flushing Bay, Newtown Creek Alliance, and Bronx River Alliance. Their tireless monitoring and organizing drive large-scale cleanup efforts.
  • Join a Shoreline Cleanup: Hands-on community cleanup days give you a direct, intimate look at the health of your local waterfront while keeping plastics and debris out of marine food webs.
  • Advocate for Equal Waterfront Access: Speak up at community board meetings and civic forums, or write op-eds and letters to the editor, to demand that waterfront revitalization projects prioritize public park space, natural shorelines, and water access for frontline communities over private luxury development.

Our urban waters are not dumping grounds—they are the living network of our city. When we clean up the debris of the past, we make room for life to flourish.

creativity

A Thousand Ships: What mythology teaches us about writing stories

Christa Avampato

I write stories about women who are underestimated and determined to rise. On the recommendation of my dear friend and storytelling mentor, John Bucher, I just finished the book A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes. It’s a retelling of Trojan War from the perspective of the women who have too often been relegated to the sidelines. A number of years ago, I wrote a screenplay about underestimated women during wartime that did well in the competition circuit. John was the first person to read it and his feedback made it better. He also said to me, “This would make a great novel.” If there’s anything I’ve learned about John in the years we’ve been friends it’s that his story instincts are always right.

Slowly I’ve been chipping away at transforming my screenplay into a book, and though it’s taking me longer than I’d like to get this draft to a place I’m happy with, I still love these characters and their story as much as I did when I started it. Still, when a project stretches over years and has been interrupted (in a good way!) by other projects, the momentum can be tough to maintain. After I finished Natalie’s book, I wondered if John might have known that this was the push I needed to keep going. Again, he was right. Here’s are some snippets from Natalie’s book that inspired me to keep writing:

“The casualties of war aren’t just the ones who die.“

This is the reason I was originally drawn to the story I’m writing. While war stories focus on the frontlines, there is a whole narrative that plays out off the battlefield. Those people silently bear an immense weight that is no less painful but often neglected or ignored, or worse, not even considered.

“War is not a sport, to be decided in a quick bout on a strip of contested land. It is a web which stretches out to the furthest parts of the world, drawing everyone into itself.”

Wars always go on for too long. Those who try to stay neutral or out of the fray are drawn in, willing or not. And so often those people are women. In my story, this is exactly what happens and once they see the inevitable, they rise up despite being pushed down.

“This is the women’s war, just as much as it is the men’s.”

When my screenplay received feedback from writing competition judges, one thing that they consistently liked was that the story was about a war without the war being the whole story. It’s also about their friendships, dreams, heartbreaks, and the difference between how society views them and how they view themselves.

“A woman who lost so much so young deserves something, even if it’s just to have her story told.” 

Even though these women aren’t fighting on the frontlines, the war is no less theirs and their stories are just as valid. Maybe even more so because they are who relate to most. From the very beginnings of storytelling, which coincide with the beginning of humanity, all people have ever wanted was to be heard and understood. It’s why we tell stories at all. It’s also why we write them.

“There are so many ways of telling a war: the entire conflict can be encapsulated in just one incident.” 

The inciting incident is where a story begins to skyrocket. It sets in motion the conflict and the action. It is what sets everything in motion. So it was in the mythology of the Trojan War. So it is in my story that I’m writing. So it is in every book and film. And also in our lives. There are defining moments where something happens and everything after is forever changed by it. It’s rarely something we choose. It’s something that happens, and then we must make meaning from it. I write to make meaning from things in my own life; I think most writers do.

“All that matters is the telling.”

There may be people who write to get an agent, a publishing contract, fortune, and fame. I write because I like writing. I write because it’s just who I am. I write to make sense of the world, and to put together an image of the world I want to live in. Are all those external benefits lovely? I’m sure they are. But they aren’t my reasons for putting fingers to keyboard or pen to paper. They would be a bonus, and if they never come my way, that’s okay. I’ll keep writing. I’ll keep telling stories because it makes me happy.

creativity

New hair. New me. New beginnings.

Christa Avampato

New hair. New me. My hair has quite a backstory. I haven’t sat in a hair salon chair in 5.5 years. Chemo, hormone suppression therapy, and regrowth took a lot longer than I expected, and the fear of letting go of any of my hair didn’t help. But I faced up to that fear, and here are the results from my first professional haircut since December 2020.

I’m so grateful to Penelope Love at Happy Sunshine Hair (and my wonderful Jane Cooke who connected me to Penelope!) for teaching me how to love and take care of my chemo curls that are now here to stay. She used my existing products. No upsells. No criticism. Just her talents, teaching, and support. She’s an independent stylist who rents her chair at a hair collective meaning the fee for the cut goes entirely to her, not a big brand. Happy Sunshine is a collective of 10 stylists making their way together in the beauty industry in NYC, a fashion capital of the world. (I’ll put a link to their site and Penelope’s in the comments below if you want to check them out!)

For most people, chemo curls fade after a couple of years, but I’m one of the few who is now a permanent curly girl. Penelope showed me how to own that with pride instead of mourning my original hair.

This weekend also marked a big medical shift. About 99% of the letrozole is now out of my system. The lupron will be hanging around in my system for a few more months while the tamoxifen ramps up. We’ll see how that goes!

I’m already feeling a lot better: less chronic pain in my joints and muscles, more flexibility, less fatigue and insomnia, fewer hot flashes, and less depression.

Cheers to starting a new chapter. I’m excited to celebrate with a vacation in Canada starting Monday. Let’s go have an adventure. I’m ready!

creativity

From Peels to Pavers: How Food Waste Can Build Our Cities

Christa Avampato
Photo by Teo Zac on Unsplash

When we think about building sustainable cities, our focus often turns to what we should eliminate such as single-use plastics and gas-fueled appliances. What if the future of urban resilience isn’t only about reducing what we consume, but actively reimagining what we discard?

Right now, food waste represents one of the largest systemic challenges in our urban ecosystems. When organic scraps end up in landfills, they decompose anaerobically and release methane, a greenhouse gas significantly more potent than carbon dioxide. Then there’s also the matter of all the resources such as land, water, and labor that were used to create the wasted food. At the same time, our construction sector relies heavily on carbon-intensive, extractive materials like traditional concrete.

A team of designers and researchers from my undergrad alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, decided to connect food waste with the needs of construction industry into a single, elegant solution. Their project asks a radical question: What if yesterday’s citrus peels and coffee grounds could become building materials?

The Science of Circular Construction

The project, emerging from Penn’s Weitzman School of Design, transforms discarded organic waste into durable, biodegradable building pavers.

Here is how this circular process works:

  • Harnessing Natural Binders: Instead of relying on energy-intensive synthetic polymers or Portland cement, the team extracts natural binders from citrus rinds and other fruit scraps. Pectin and cellulose fibers create structural bonds naturally when processed correctly.
  • Low-Carbon Fabrication: The mixture of shredded organic waste and natural binders cures with minimal heat and pressure compared to standard concrete manufacturing, dramatically slashing embedded carbon emissions.
  • Load-Bearing Utility: The resulting pavers are strong enough for outdoor walking paths, patio spaces, and urban gardens, providing a functional alternative to conventional masonry.
  • Return to the Soil: Unlike concrete—which remains rubble forever—these biomaterial pavers can eventually degrade naturally at the end of their lifecycle, returning nutrients back to the earth without shedding toxic microplastics or chemicals.

Rethinking Waste as a Resource Stream

What makes this project so compelling for community agency is its local potential. We don’t need exotic, imported materials to create sustainable infrastructure. Every neighborhood already produces tons of organic matter every single day through local coffee shops, juice bars, grocery stores, and home kitchens.

By viewing our urban waste streams as raw material pipelines, we can decentralize manufacturing, reduce municipal hauling costs, and create localized economies that turn kitchen trash into civic assets.

The Togetherhood Takeaway

Resilience means closing the loops in our daily lives and recognizing the hidden structural value in the things we throw away.

  • Audit Your Household Waste Stream: Look at your kitchen trash this week. How much of what you throw away is organic matter that could be composted or repurposed? Supporting municipal compost programs keeps organic material out of landfills where it causes the most damage.
  • Champion Circular Procurement: In your workplace or local community projects, advocate for bio-based and circular materials. Whether choosing reclaimed wood, mushroom packaging, or bio-composite tiles, prioritize products designed with their end-of-life in mind.
  • Support Student & University Innovation: Breakthroughs in urban sustainability often start in university design labs. Follow and amplify the work of interdisciplinary research hubs working on biomaterials, circular textiles, and regenerative architecture.

The materials to build a greener world are already in our hands—and in our compost bins. When we learn to design with nature rather than against it, our cities become cleaner and healthier.

creativity

Day 1: What these meds taught me

Christa Avampato
Photo of me after acupuncture this week

And here we go! This morning, I took my last pill of letrozole. This afternoon, I will see my oncologist, get the prescription for my new medication that will hopefully have fewer side effects and help me feel better, and start a cutting edge monitoring program that detects even a hint of recurrence at the cellular level. (More on that in a later post.) Happily, I will NOT have to get a lupron shot as part of my appointment; I’m done with those, too.

Just before I woke up this morning, I had a dream where I was standing at a podium, talking about what I learned from cancer. I woke up and wrote down as much as I could remember. Cancer taught me:

1.) to give myself grace and give myself a break

2.) I have the right to feel all my feelings

3.) to be tough and more empathetic

4.) I can feel complex, conflicting emotions

5.) to be fearless

6.) how to ask for help and stopped feeling any shame about anything

7.) to let my light shine.

8.) there’s absolutely nothing wrong with loving the crap out of everything.

9.) to go for it, whatever it is.

10.) to tell my friends I love them all the time.

11.) I don’t need to spend time doing anything I don’t want to do. If I can’t do it with my whole heart, then I just don’t do it. If I’m in the midst of something and getting no joy from it, I stop.

12.) stop pushing through just to prove I could. To live, sure. Out of of some made up obligation, nah. The word “should” has left my vocabulary.

13.) to love working out every day.

14.) to take a lot of pride in taking care of my health – my diet, my stress level, my mental, physical, and emotional health. I’m healthier and more whole than I’ve ever been. 

15.) to be grateful for all of it.

Thank you to everyone who helped me along this journey. I still have 5 more years of medications, and I’m celebrating this milestone. I’ll take every win I can get. Long may they continue.

creativity

Day 2: Our Own Odyssey

Christa Avampato
Me at home

“Going home doesn’t feel like triumph. It feels like relief.” ~Dr. John Bucher, Joseph Campbell Foundation executive director

A few weeks ago, I had the great fortune to listen to my friend and mentor, John Bucher, talk about The Odyssey at Los Angeles’s Getty Villa. The title of his talk was “No Place Like Home: Why The Odyssey Is the Story We Keep Retelling”. (His talk is streaming on YouTube and you can watch here.)

I’ve been thinking about the idea of home a lot recently. Homer’s ancient Greek epic The Odyssey follows Odysseus, king of Ithaca, as he spends 10 years trying to get home after the Trojan War. While he faces monsters, storms, and gods, his wife, Penelope, and son Telemachus fight off aggressive suitors taking over his palace. As John explains, it’s about the war after the war and finding an answer to the question, “How do we go home when home no longer exists?”

It struck me so clearly that Odysseus’s journey is in many ways like a quest all of us have had. For me, his journey parallels my healing from cancer. My 10-year medication journey like his 10-year trek. The dog who is waiting for him so faithfully and then passes once he’s sure of his father’s return – much like how Phinny passed once he knew I would be okay in every way. Odysseus’s home was nothing like the one he left. Neither is my body.

John went on to say, “We might prefer to skip the journey. What we learn is that the journey is worth it.” And I feel that in my every cell of my body. I hate that I got cancer. It’s not a journey I ever wanted to take, not a community of survivors I ever wanted to join. But I had no choice. The journey back to wellness was forced on me. I had to fight, or die. And I wanted to live, so I fought. It was worth it because I learned what I was made of at my core. I learned how people feel about me while I’m still among the living. Best of all, I got to help so many others by lighting the way along their own difficult journeys.

Home isn’t a place, at least not for me. Home is love. Home is belonging. Home is friendship. Home is being a part of something bigger than myself. Home is purpose. Home is something I carry with me, always, in all ways, everywhere I go.

creativity

Day 3: Being Alive is Grand

Christa Avampato
My last bottle of letrozole

“I like living. I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow; but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing.” ~Agatha Christie

To make sure I never forget to take my meds and supplements, I parse them out each week. Today, I parsed out my last 2 pills of letrozole and tossed the empty bottle in this photo into the recycling bin. And I smiled and cried.

I’m grateful for its service; it’s kept me alive and cancer-free for the 5 years and 3 months I’ve taken it. And I’m so looking forward to bidding it farewell; the painful and difficult physical, mental, and emotional side effects have been a daily struggle to bear. And I have mostly carried them in silence so they wouldn’t overtake me.

Inching closer to ending one chapter and beginning another, I’ve felt a shift. That something in me is changing. That my small corner of the world around me is changing. That this is about so much more than switching medications.

It’s about getting to begin again. To reshape my life. To build back better, from the inside out. In the immortal words of Whitesnake, I don’t know where I’m going but I sure know where I’ve been. And I can’t wait to see what lies ahead. It will be grand just because I get to live it. I’m ready for an adventure.