Hitting the deck: traversing the embodied city

I’m not simply talking about the everyday experience of “walking in the city”, as Michel de Certeau would have it. I’m talking about the residue of the street that builds up on the soles of your feet, the dust and fumes that irritate the mucous membrane, the seduction of the olfactory imagination with the aromas of grimy restaurant exhaust fans, caressing the air with the spunk of a dozen promiscuous cuisines.