For artists, it's the centre of the world. Anneke Rautenbach meets four young South Africans who are making the Big Apple their own. "I felt like I was in a scene from Rent," says Shariffa Ali, of the first night she spent in New York, in a draughty warehouse in Brooklyn. A friend of a friend had put her up in his communal home - a converted industrial space in Bushwick - for the night. "It was early spring, still cold. I remember feeling not quite scared, just very ready."A University of Cape Town theatre graduate, Ali was over the moon to be invited to collaborate on a two-week project in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. America was, after all, a dream come true. But shortly after she arrived, the project lost its funding. She set off for New York, found a new collaborator, and when no rehearsal space was available, they used rooftops and cemeteries.mini_story_image_hleft1It's two years later and the long-limbed 24-year-old sits across from me in The Library, a dusky bar at the theatre where she now works in Manhattan's East Village. Gilded volumes line the walls, and brass lamps cast a rosy glow. "Still came about at the time of the Trayvon Martin verdict," says Ali of her first show, referring to the black youth who was shot dead in Florida in 2012 by neighbourhood watch member George Zimmerman. A year later, Zimmerman was acquitted of murder.With a professional dancer she met in New York, Ali had co-written and produced Still, which debuted at the Alchemical Theatre Laboratory in the West Village. "The timing was right. It was the story of an unborn black man surveying the state of the world he is about to enter, and it struck a nerve with audiences. There were tears in the room."She was soon introduced to Cynthia Nixon - best known for her role as Miranda in Sex and the City - by a friend who knew Nixon's partner. Nixon was so taken with the young talent that she recommended her for a paid internship at the Public Theatre, an acclaimed company that presents Shakespeare in the Park and much else besides. "Growing up, I was always surrounded by strong, powerful women like my mother and her friends. Cynthia has been a similar kind of mentor to me here."story_article_right1Ali is not the only young African artist of her generation to roll the dice in New York City's creative game. The stakes are high: with living expenses amounting to a minimum of $2,000 a month (about R27,000) and university fees approaching $40,000 a year, New York is one of the world's priciest cities. But while it's universally recognised as a place that chews up and spits out its young, it's also a place where - with a strong dose of talent and a bit of luck - you just might win big.When jazz singer Vuyo Sotashe was growing up in Butterworth, Eastern Cape, the odds stacked against a career in New York seemed insurmountable. Sotashe is a slender young man in horn-rimmed spectacles. One of five children, he was raised by his mother, a schoolteacher. "I don't know how she did it. She instilled a crazy work ethic in us from a young age."The 25-year-old has mastered each challenge that came his way, from winning a string of singing competitions to acquiring a Bachelor of Music at UCT despite having no formal music education. His biggest triumph was the Fulbright Scholarship for postgraduate study in the US. With the legendary Manhattan School of Music in mind, Sotashe applied - and won. "My scholarship didn't place me in New York but at the William Paterson University in New Jersey - still close enough to intern at the Lincoln Centre for the Performing Arts."The Fulbright was a huge break, but it didn't mean a cushy life. "My first year in the States involved a lot of instant noodles."Film-scorer Andrew Orkin, 27, also a Fulbright scholar, had a rough landing in Manhattan's Lower East Side. "The room I was staying in was about my height square, in a pretty dingy area," he says from beneath a floppy blond fringe. "Coming from leafy Parkview in Joburg, I'd never lived in a city centre before. I found I could be surrounded by people at all hours, yet still feel utterly alone."full_story_image_hright2For actress Phumzile Sitole, 25, it was a tougher ride to New York, and didn't get any easier upon arrival. Having received a partial scholarship from Columbia University, she had to find ways to supplement the remaining cost. "Before leaving home, I enlisted a bunch of friends to fundraise at a traffic intersection in Fourways, Johannesburg. We made about R10." She giggles, flashing a wide, gap-toothed smile.She received a grant from the Oppenheimer Memorial Trust and donations from a few family members, but it was only enough to keep her afloat for the first year of her three-year MA in acting. On top of her financial uncertainty, Sitole suffered the heartache of her father dying in a car accident last year. "It's the hardest thing to be far away when all you want is to be around your loved ones. I managed to go home for two weeks, but then had to go straight back to school."mini_story_image_hleft3A classmate, Folami Williams, came to her rescue. "Her family effectively took me in and we now share a room in the brownstone where her mom grew up in Brooklyn. It's really thanks to this family that I'm still in the States."Sitole has also caught the attention of Tony Award-winning director Gregory Mosher (Anything Goes; Our Town), who cast her as the lead in his production, Antigone in the World. Sitole was delighted to visit home when the production toured South Africa and Kenya.After sleeping on a couch in New Rochelle for longer than she cares to remember and sharing beds with friends in Newark and in Brooklyn, Ali has earned her artist's visa. She is working alongside Nixon as assistant director on a one-woman show featuring the spoken-word poet, Staceyann Chin.story_article_right2Sotashe has turned his internship into a job at Jazz at Lincoln Centre, and has performed at the venue as well as on National Public Radio.Orkin, with an MA under his belt, landed a job at the production company Fall on Your Sword, where he has worked on the soundtracks of two documentaries by Academy Award-winning director Alex Gibney, including Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine.Orkin says the biggest lesson he's learnt in New York is that "you can't beat people at their own game". "I felt totally out of my depth at New York University's music school, until I learnt to trust my unique perspective as a South African. My adviser sat me down and said, 'You're bringing something totally new to the table.'"Similarly, Sotashe pays homage to his Xhosa roots in his composition, something he says sets him apart from those coming out of the US music college system. "In this town, being South African is a gift."Sitole says: "I keep telling myself that money is just printed paper. It might be special paper. You might not have a lot of it, but if you're talented enough there will be someone who wants to invest in you." And every barbecue-flavoured instant noodle becomes worth it...