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Oh, and entry is free, so it's available to anyone regardless of economic status.
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You're liable to see families picnicking, bums gathering bottles and cans, geese foraging, and deer cautiously wandering the edge of the woods.
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Within a hundred yards of each other.
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Some of that cheap real estate isn't too horrible, either.
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There's a whole street being taken over by artists, Farnsworth between Moran and McDougall.
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Some of the things they've done down there are amazing, and the community garden is a great bridge to the surrounding neighborhood.
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In fact, the article went on, soon a nearby house went on the market for $100.
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America's Rust Belt is a swath of cities and towns that boomed during the Industrial Era and now lie -- well, rusting -- as empty remainders of glory days past.
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A few weeks ago, someone broke into their shed to steal their garden tools.
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Think about that for a moment, hoes and shovels don't have enough pawn value to be worth carrying out.
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Whoever took that stuff is probably using it in their own garden.
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Yes, Detroit's got more than its share of bad spots, you're right.
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I've lived in the metro area my whole life, and there are areas (I can't call them neighborhoods) down there where I don't feel safe in daytime, much less at night.
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But there are bright spots, and behind every one of them is a person, or a bunch of people, who refuse to give up.
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Jessica 19. Sep, 2009 at 10:30 am
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The artist types notified their buddies, who moved in post haste.
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You are exactly the kind of person who gives me back the hope I lost on my way into town.
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Seems there's a pretty solid group of Detroit residents who are truly committed to restoring the city, and that's beautiful to see.
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I will absolutely watch A City To Yourself, thank you for the recommendation.
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Reader Not Writer 20. Sep, 2009 at 10:17 pm
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Well, growing up not far from Detroit myself, I would point out a few things:
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I was intrigued.
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Really?
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"solidarity"
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A $100 house?
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Most of the funny looks you got were less about your color than about your ride.
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You think I'm kidding, but I couldn't be more serious -- that Honda is a visceral reminder for people of how the American consumer has left Detroit in the dust.
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Even if it was a real fixer-upper, even if you really were better off tearing it down than living in it, that'd still be a hell of a deal.
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2. Detroit (proper) has been dying for a long time -- before the 1968 riots, even.
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Its going to take some pioneering individuals to start creating those pockets of innovation, creativity, and vision.
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But its not going to happen with the investment of $100 into a single house.
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The next moment, Acres was there.
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Hands up in the same way mine were frozen.
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We just looked at each other.
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I guess, thinking back, I might have expected him to gloat, but the view was the kind of thing that humbles you, shuts your mouth.
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We just stood looking at each other for a little while, I don't know how long.
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What is it?
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he wasn't the sort you'd call "Chuck."
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A place.
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I don't know.
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I think this whole thing," he waved his hand at the horizon, "is one big machine.
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And the markers were carved later, not be whoever built it.
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The markers are places where it's safe to come here and leave.
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Safe?
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I looked around.
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One thing this place didn't seem was safe.
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He started walking down the steps and around a corner.
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It would have taken plenty to surprise me after what I had already seen, but My jaw was banging against my shoelaces when I rounded that corner.
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'm a linguistics researcher, Ed.
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I'm not sure how something so big could have been hidden by that little turn in landscape, but maybe perspective doesn't work quite the same there.
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Glaring down at me from no more than twenty feet away was a grimacing, thirty foot tall black face with staring, blue and white eyes and it wore a ridiculous little hat.
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He took a sip and closed his eyes like the cheap cup of coffee was really something special.
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For some reason I thought of a giant clown face from a carnival ride, but it scared the hell out me.
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Acres stood beside it and somehow using him as a yardstick for the scale of the thing made it easier to see.
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It was a moai.
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This is what I wanted to show you.
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I looked down and saw he was pointing to another marker just slightly different from the one we had just left.
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I was pretty rattled, but things fell together for me looking at the big statue, the Hawaiian shirt and the mark on the ground.
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Acres nodded.
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It was all too much for me so I focused on the part I could handle.
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So what does this have to do with gold?
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You could step on that marker and make the gestures, the 'device,' and it would be like pushing a button in a very complex machine.
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You would end up on a small hill on Rapa Nui.
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You could step three feet to the right and do the same thing, and you would end up buried alive in a nearby rock face.
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But I know how to make it take me anywhere.
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He pulled a sheet of folded paper from his pocket and handed it to me.
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It read, "Department of the Treasury, Financial Management Service, Status Report of U.S. Treasury-Owned Gold."
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I sucked in a whole lot of air.
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Anywhere?
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Anywhere," he walked around the moai and came back wrestling with a big, heavy bar of gold.
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They only check deep storage once a year.
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Otherwise the vault is sealed.
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He set the cup down and looked straight at me for the first time.
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Does anyone else know about this?
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No, they would have been on Rapa Nui if they knew, ready to stop me.
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This is the 400 ounces which I mentioned at the restaurant.
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About $150,000 dollars at this morning's rate.
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I hadn't seen him since high-school, maybe twenty years before, and we were never buddies in the first place.
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I looked at the sheet in my hand.
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I had to read it twice.
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I had never seen a dollar sign in front of that many number before.
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I thought they didn't keep gold there anymore, just nerve gas.
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The gold is still there.
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How much can we sell before someone becomes suspicious?
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Charles put the bar down and slid a web pouch over it with shoulder straps like a small backpack.
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"None," I said and slipped the knife into his neck right at the base of his skull.
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Call me small minded, but you know "a bird in the hand."
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But I could handle a hundred and fifty-K easy, say seventy-five-K from the fence.
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Fine.
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I slipped the little pouch over my back and wiped the knife on his jacket.
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I waived down a waitress and ordered a cup of decaf and a slice of pie.
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Then I made my way back to the little marker where we came in.
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His mistake had been in telling me the same gesture opened the door the other way.
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I worried for just a moment when I started waving my hands.
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So the icy wind at the top of the mound and the bright moon came as a real relief.
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The gold was heavy on my back, and I was all the way to the car before I realized I had left the keys on Charles.
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The highway patrol was just bound to come by then.
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After that it was just connect the dots back to prison.
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The rental car records pointed to Acres, and there was enough blood on the knife to match DNA from Acres comb in the motel.
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