Leaky Hookah- Shahara East

on the outside of this east village hooka bar there are great colorful yellow signs with a sort of make shift hand drawn feel. you can see the sign that says Sahara East hookah bar. when i walked in the door there was no one seated in the front and i was a little confused. then i saw down the long narrow hallway lights coming from the back and people seated smoking shisha of different varieties. the first thing that i noticed about this hooka bar were the very bright lights which were quite misgiving due to the relaxing nature that a hookah bar should have while people are engaged in smoking sheesha. i thought wow these lights are bright. so in the front of the establishment you can see that it is a restaurant and i figured that the back would be a lounge type area with comfortable couches and dim lighting. instead there was a restaurant style seating with hard chairs around stiff tables. the back area of this hookah bar looked sort of like a tent that one might see in the middle of the dessert, covered with tapestries and hanging lights. this was ok but as i said before the lights were too bright. the hookah was poor and 15$. there is a one drink minimum at this bar and they are all 5.00, even the water! there is strange middle eastern up tempo music playing. they really need to make this back area a lounge if they want to make it cool. they serve nakhla tobacco and walnut coals! the tobacco is low grade but the coals were of an excellent wood variety. we got mint raspberry and our hookah was very leaky. this was all in all a disapointment. this bar has a high school vibe reminiscent of fraternity boys and drunken louts. the hookah had a strange licorice taste and it was obvious that it was not cleaned well. the mango juice was heavily sweetened. this is not the best hooka bar by any means but if you are a high school kid or a frat guy this may be the place for you, as we should try to keep these types in a fixed location:) just kidding.