{"id":467873,"date":"2025-12-24T01:45:18","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T01:45:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/467873\/"},"modified":"2025-12-24T01:45:18","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T01:45:18","slug":"nycs-first-lady-deflates-when-asked-about-living-in-manhattan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/467873\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC’s first lady ‘deflates’ when asked about living in Manhattan"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Yorkers finally got to meet our soon-to-be first lady, Rama Duwaji<\/a>, Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The 28-year-old artist, who was completely absent during her husband Zohran Mamdani\u2019s successful bid to take the city\u2019s top job<\/a>, has declined most media but said yes to a cover shoot with The Cut.<\/p>\n

And no wonder. The magazine fawned over her as both a style icon and an independent woman.<\/p>\n

New York City\u2019s soon-to-be first lady Rama Duwaji is featured on the new cover of The Cut. @thecut\/Instagram<\/p>\n

But, more than anything, this profile underscores her youth.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s a Gen Z\u2019er who gushes about being in \u201cplatonic love\u201d with her friends and how they discuss if \u201cUsher is hot or not.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\tMore From\t\t\t\t\t\t\tKirsten Fleming<\/p>\n

The icebreaker she used to ask on dates: \u201cWhat kind of fruit would you be and why?\u201d<\/p>\n

Previously, she\u2019d say she was a \u201csweet and tart\u201d raspberry. But after a mayoral election where she was, really, treated with kid gloves by the media, Duwaji\u2019s a lychee: \u201cslightly hardened shell but still open and soft on the inside.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for any insight into her husband\u2019s platform, we only learn that she and Mamdani are \u201cfocused on protein right now. Don\u2019t sleep on cottage cheese. Put some chives on it \u2014 it\u2019s really good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rama Duwaji and Zohran Mamdani will soon move to Gracie Mansion, a location change that Duwaji doesn\u2019t seem to embrace. Elder Ordonez\/INSTARimages<\/p>\n

Born in Houston and raised in New Jersey and Dubai, Duwaji has little life experience and even less experience in New York City. Like many of the people who voted for her husband, she\u2019s a recent transplant, having moved to the Big Apple in 2021.<\/p>\n

What she has is a sense of personal style that\u2019s arty and hip. She\u2019s attractive in an offbeat way and makes for a striking model in dark clothing with exaggerated silhouettes, even if some of the outfits look like they\u2019re from the closet of a cartoon villain.<\/p>\n

Though I respect Duwaji\u2019s ability to pull off a \u201cbixie\u201d (a bob-pixie combo), The Cut\u2019s writer\u2019s assertion that women are asking hairstylists for \u201cthe Rama\u201d is, surely, overstated.<\/p>\n

More understated is Duwaji\u2019s approach to her new role as first lady. Her \u201ctop priority\u201d will be to help undiscovered artists \u201cmake it in the city.\u201d OK.<\/p>\n

Not that she isn\u2019t interested in politics. Just not so much the issues of New York City.<\/p>\n

Rama Duwaji has openly mourned the death of Hamas propagandist Saleh al-Jafarawi on her instagram.<\/p>\n

\u201cSpeaking out about Palestine<\/a>, Syria, Sudan \u2014 all these things are really important to me \u2026 It feels fake to talk about anything else when that\u2019s all that\u2019s on my mind, all I want to put down on paper,\u201d she says.
\u201cEverything is political.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mamdani is quoted in the piece, too, revealing that when he got serious about running for mayor, Duwaji told him, \u201c100 percent go for it.\u201d But when it comes to the attention \u2014\u00a0and yes, some online trolling \u2014 she\u2019s received, he said, \u201cShe did not sign up for this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Except she did. This is what it means to be a public figure in 2025. No matter what side of the aisle a politician occupies, their spouse is a fair target.<\/p>\n

Even if Duwaji did make herself so scarce on the campaign trail, choosing to let her portfolio of nakedly political art speak for her.<\/p>\n

The Cut bizarrely admonishes the acknowledgement of her art\u2019s messaging.<\/p>\n

\u201cHer work has attracted its share of haters, too, like\u00a0New York\u00a0Post<\/a>\u00a0reporters who accuse her of using her art to \u2018rage against US imperialism\u2019 and express sympathy to \u2018notorious terrorist propagandists,’\u201d the piece states.<\/p>\n

The Cut called The Post \u201chaters\u201d for reporting on Rama Duwaji\u2019s art \u2014 and quoting her statement on \u201cAmerican imperialism.\u201d Rama Duwaji<\/p>\n

But reporting on what she\u2019s explicitly said on social media <\/strong>is not hate.<\/p>\n

On Instagram, Duwaji has expressed sorrow over the death of Hamas propagandaist Saleh Al-Jafarawi<\/a> , known as Mr. FAFO. She\u2019s posted her own artwork, inscribed with messages like \u201cAmerican imperialism never changes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Duwaji said her messages are \u201cmisconstrued,\u201d but offered no alternative explanation for her words.<\/p>\n

\u201cI stopped trying to control how people perceive the work that I do,\u201d she said. \u201cPeople just see what they want to see.\u201d<\/p>\n

But really, people see what you write and say.<\/p>\n

Mayor elect Zohran Mamdani and his wife Rama Duwaji celebrated his win on election night. REUTERS<\/p>\n

As for the couple\u2019s upcoming move to historic Gracie Mansion, Duwaji is a poor pitiful Pearl of a victim.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuwaji will now have for neighbors some of the very people who have lobbed the loudest accusations of antisemitism and the baldest Islamophobic attacks on her husband,\u201d the writer says.<\/p>\n

I assume that\u2019s a reference to New Yorkers who were offended by his unwillingness to denounce the phrase \u201cGlobalize the intifada.\u201d<\/p>\n

But her husband has assured us that he wants to be a mayor for all New Yorkers.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuwaji takes a breath, pausing when I ask her about becoming an Upper East Sider, and then deflates,\u201d the story continues. \u201cIt\u2019ll be fine,\u201d our first lady-to-be says.<\/p>\n

It feels petulant and ungrateful.<\/p>\n

I only hope that, after her husband tries to implement his pie-in-the-sky socialist platform, New Yorkers can say the same: That we\u2019ll be fine.<\/p>\n

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