first we'll take manhattan

i love new york.

my friend liz and i made a short little trip down, cause, well, i'm running out of time out east and i needed to see new york. we got in at 6 am from the torture that is an overnight greyhound (made even more painful by the 1 am stop at the border) and wandered around times square in a daze, with only street cleaners and the NYPD to keep us company. we wandered north, picked up a sunday edition of the new york times and meandered through central park until the excitement began to fade as exhaustion sunk in. we took a little nap near a fountain, until the sun got too hot and we decided it was time for some fifth avenue gawking. tiffany's! fifth ave saks! the infamous apple store! we ate a hot pretzel, but it was still frozen inside. alas. we tried to walk all the way down to the lower east side, but then realized it was seventy blocks in the hot sun and we both wilted a little. subway time! even taking public transit seemed exciting in new york. had our first (but not last) slice of new york pizza. cheesy. delish. tired.

took a nap and then wandered for a while, looking through some vintage stores - but this was new york after all. i gawked at beautiful shoes and dresses and cried a few tears when i looked at their price tags. ah well, happy hour cheered us up, and then we went to the top of the rockefeller centre which cheered us up even more. NEW YORK! it's so big, so urban, so famous. chrysler building, central park, empire state building, all at once. then liz proposed to me, and i said YES! then liz mooned all of northern manhattan. and we watched the sun set over the city and that was also not so bad.

then we wandered around times square, trying on makeup and trying not to think about the diseases we were going to get. found ourselves back in the east village, went for a beer on houston street and realized we had wandered into some sort of karaoke night filled with NYU theatre and music students. a skinny white girl with big glasses rocked a couple of salt and peppa songs (holy shit, not many people can pull off 'what a man' at karaoke), some broadway boy did a rousing rendition of bohemian rhapsody and by the time jesse's girl came on everyone was flailing around on the dance floor. i've never seen people rock out so much to karaoke. a pretty boy in a sweater vest convinced liz to go up and sing fat bottomed girls. that got the dancers flailing some more.

the next morning we slept in a bit, grabbed coffee at a little stand (75 cents, what a steal) and grabbed the subway up to times square. five minutes after we got out of the subway station thunder began to rumble, and about two blocks later (thirty or so to go) the sky cracked open and it poured like a motherfucker. unfortunately we were right on the edge of central park with not a single store or cafe or awning to hide under, so we huddled under a tree with some other unfortunate souls. that stayed dry for about seven seconds and then we resigned ourselves to a day of squishy shoes and damp sweaters. when the rain let up we walked up to the museum of natural history which was, unfortunately, well air-conditioned. shivered through the asian mammals, the peoples of asia and africa, the dinosaurs, the ocean mammals, the birds, etc etc until we shivered out into the light of day. liz wandered off to strawberry fields and i hurried down to the MoMA before it closed. HOLY SHIT. the museum of modern art is amazing. the most famous art by the most famous artists; andy warhol's soup cans, six or so wall sized jackson pollocks, willem de kooning's woman I, newman's onement 1, a bunch of rothko's, cezanne, seurat, van gogh, picasso, degas, matisse, marcel duchamp's 'in advance of a broken arm', kahlo, jasper john's 'flag', man ray, cindy sherman, barbara kruger... there must have been billions and billions of dollar's worth of art in there. i had chills. and i barely scratched the surface in the three hours i had. and i didn't even make it to the guggenheim, the met, the whitney, or any of the contemporary galleries. ART HEAVEN! i can't wait to go back.

liz and i met up later and took the ferry to staten island and back, which was a nice free way to see the statue of liberty up close. we caught the boat right at sunset, which was quite nice, and it had a beautiful view of manhattan too. it was nice to smell the ocean - it's been quite some time.

we went to some dive later on whose selling point was 1.50 beers and 5 shots for 10 dollars. (we are cheap). got hit on by some german-american republicans. liz's pretty blonde hair seemed to attract boys everywhere we went. we chatted with them for a while as they discussed the merits of mccain and the socialist leanings of barack obama while i drank the beer they bought for us and gazed off into the distance, trying not to roll my eyes. they invited us chez them after having a long discussion amongst themselves in german while constantly gesturing towards us, so we decided it was time to call it a night. oh america.

next morning liz and i separated ways; she went down to wall street and then off to catch an early bus, and i spent the entire day walking through the east village, soho, greenwich village, and chelsea. i finally caved and took the subway back up to central park to see strawberry fields and watch happy couples row around the lake. i never found the carousel, but alas, another time.

i already have a seven mile list of all the things i want to see and do next time around. perhaps the autumn next time?

i got back to montreal yesterday and i have spent my time procrastinating. matt and i leave for the gaspe tomorrow and i still haven't packed any of my stuff to move home. we will only have one more day in montreal after tomorrow, and i'm feeling very ready to go back to bc. i registered for my courses at langara yesterday and i can't say i feel much of that back to school excitement. fundamental principles of mathematics, british columbia resources and geography, canadian colonial history and a biology course of some sort. oy.

ah well, it is a step towards somewhere i think i want to be. i hope i want to be. we shall see. i am getting nervous about committing to this career path, but i also feel a bit excited.

well, a bit more than a week left, and i will be in fair vancouver by the sea. hurrah!