NYC: a travelogue (or, The Longest Post Of All Time, Part I)
The weekend of the 20th was my last trip out to Boston to see K before she graduates. I flew out Thursday and, as I write this, fly back on the following Monday. Friday we slept in a bit (after an early morning phone call from work) and wandered out to get some breakfast grub. While strolling back to her apartment K said, "What now?"
Embracing the lack of structure the weekend afforded, I said, "I dunno."
"Well, we could always go to New York."
I reflected on this. We had always wanted to get down to The City while we were in Boston, but as often happens when living in a city or region for a while we had become a bit jaded to the notion. It had just never happened in the five-plus years we lived in Boston. "Um. Okay," I said.
Now, I've managed to see a lot of my old, abandoned friends while out in Boston a couple of times before. But this time I got a little too caught up in the silly details of my life to alert said friends to this particular trip to this particular seaboard, so a couple of them were caught completely unawares. It was down to last-minute planning to see any of them at all and and I have to say, skating off to New York really enhanced those efforts greatly. Some friend I am.
The whole thing was a completely spur-of-the-moment thing (which, really, is one of the best ways to find yourself in New York, I should think). "Life," as K and I so very often remind each other, "is an adventure."
Prologue: a disclaimer (or, Why This Goes On and On and On)
I'm not much on journaling as journaling, and as you probably know, I feel I owe you reader(s) of my journal pretty much nothing. Long stretches of time pass between my entries because, well, I wanna. And when they do come along it's usually me grousing about how Amtrak doesn't know how to configure its web server or some such trivial fluff. This one's kind of different. I figure I'll come back and read this one, so I'm writing more for my memory than for your enjoyment. I mean, not like I consider your enjoyment when I'm writing on here anyway, right? But this time, even less so. If you're not up for detailed descriptions of a New York neophyte's trip, now would be a good time to go read the Ironic Times or something.
Chapter one: logistics (or, The Quickest Way To Find Out What's At The Bottom Of A Cliff)
Aside from figuring out how to not end up seeing many of our friends, the first order of business was to figure out how to get there on short notice. Plan A was the train, but it turned out to be a bit more expensive than we thought, overbooked, and besides which Amtrak suspended service that day (narrowly dodged a bullet there). Plan B was flying down to minimize sitting-on-our-ass time and maximize city-gawking time, but that turned out to be twice the price of the already expensive train (and once we found ourselves looking at connecting flights the whole ass-sitting-avoidance thing was out the window). Renting a car seemed like a good plan C, except for one, none of the rental places would be open on Sunday to return the damn thing and for two, the car rental web sites are so laughably poorly designed that I was rapidly losing my temper just trying to get the damn things to work. Stupid web sites. Hire a usability person and listen to them, for the sake of fuck.
Anyway.
Plan D was the Fung Wah Bus at a heady $30 round trip. The Fung Wah was born of a gray-market transportation system between the respective China Towns of Boston and New York. It was sketchy to the point of bordering on human smuggling. rubyred660 actually took one of these down to NYC in its early days and described it as decrepit van with no seat belts, where they shoved you bodily in and if your bag didn't fit on your lap, it didn't go. There was a single whirlwind pit-stop at some location in Connecticut and, she said, "They don't take a head count so if you miss it, you're S.O.L." unsound didn't have personal experience as a passenger but let us know that, "Those things haul ass," having been passed by one on the highway.
I get oddly nervous on speeding buses as it is, so the prospect of clinging to my bag in a vehicle where the seats may or may not be securely bolted down careening through Boston-New York traffic was a wee bit uninviting. But it had four things going for it. One, price. Two, available tickets and reservations (which already sounded incongruously sophisticated, since rubyred660 had told us that the "ticket office" was a closet-sized hole somewhere in China Town). Three, price. And four, it was so delightfully improvised and shady.
Then came the question of lodgings. This too had to be last-second. While I was busy cursing the car rental web sites (like they aren't thoroughly cursed already), Kristan started looking at where we could spend the night. For a while now she's been wanting to stay at the W Hotel -- kind of a sleek, minimalist upscale affair. Once we figured we would be saving a bundle on transportation (and also because the precious few available rooms for that night were literally disappearing between mouse clicks), we decided to splurge a bit and go with the W. And, since K gamely dedicated herself to being shamelessly touristy, we reserved a room in Times Square. Famously sketchy transportation to unnecessarily glitzy lodgings. Perfect.
And just like that, there was no turning back. Crikey.
Chapter two: the trip down (or, Them Chinese Drive A Damn Fine Bus)
Up at the crack of dawn, packed light, moving fast. We had thought the pick-up point was China Town, but the web site said Boston's South Station. Fair 'nuff. We braced ourselves for what would certainly prove to be one of the best anecdotes of the trip: the infamous Fung Wah Bus.
So, our expectations were betrayed almost from the get-go. For starters, we weren't lurking down some dark alleyway in China Town, waiting for the vehicle to lurch to a stop and some noisy Chinese broad to plant her hands on my ass and shove me head-first into it, plopping a chicken on my lap before I could get my bearings. Instead, this was an honest to goodness bus station. Granted, the ticketing process was somewhat ad hoc affair and the guy running the door resembled nothing more than a Mandarin bouncer, but still. It was all very clean and efficient and on the level.
We knew that in the meantime Fung Wah had actually gone and bought themselves some actual buses, but since prices hadn't changed we figured these were going to be broken-down Soviet-surplus-grade Greyhound rejects that passed vehicle inspection only by piping part of the exhaust into the passenger compartment. As we stood there half dreading and half relishing the impending arrival of our stupendously iffy ride, we elbowed each other as a nice new shiny comfy bus came around the corner. "Yeah, that's us, huh?" we joked.
And of course, it was. The Fung Wah had gone legit. The bus was great. Comfy seats that recline, air conditioning with individual vents, reading lights, functioning brakes even. The ride was speedy and smooth and aside from a traffic jam in Connecticut (apparently New York's biggest item of export is traffic) efficient and thoroughly enjoyable.
Huh.
Chapter three: arrival (or, Putting My East Coast Training To Use)
I've been to NYC several times before, mostly business trips and all very brief excursions with minimal chance for actual checking out the place. K had been there a few times before as well and had a resident New Yorker to show her around a bit, so between us we knew enough to get us into trouble. But aside from that we hadn't really gone delving in the city built to be delved, so if any of this seems kind of naive, you know why.
The Fung Wah disgorged us at the base of the Manhattan bridge, on the cusp of China Town. The only thing we had resembling a plan was the fact that we needed to check into our hotel at some point, which would also relieve us of our bags. We hadn't so much as bought or even consulted a map of New York City. Thus we had the first of many, "What now?" moments. Faced with a myriad of choices the parameters of which were themselves not clear, having not yet discussed our goals or success metrics for the trip, and lacking any guiding principles or even so much as a map, we proceeded in the most wise and productive manner possible under the circumstances: we wandered off in search of whatever.
Specifically this led us along West Canal Street and into the throngs of China Town. As coffee shops are to Seattle, so ad hoc street vendors are to New York City sidewalks. And when I say ad hoc I mean "definitely off the books, somewhere between gray and black market, and quite possibly a simple fence for stolen goods." The streets of China Town are packed with these things: people hawking obviously illicit DVD's ("DVD! DVD! DVD!" chant the peddlers); cheap knock-off purses; cheap knock-off watches; cheap knock-off sunglasses; plastic jewelry of all sorts; t-shirts and other touristy goo-gahs. Some guys lurked about holding brief cases with eyes darting about, trying to conspicuously inconspicuously make eye contact to spark the famous, "Hey buddy, you looking for a [thing]?" conversation. The shops themselves were alternately aimed at tourists (t-shirts, trinkets), natives (all manner of goods stacked to the ceiling and waiting to be haggled over), and the residents of China Town (who knows what, except it was labeled in Chinese and strewn about in what appeared to be a haphazard fashion that was obviously deliberate in its own inscrutable way).
The sidewalks teemed with people. I've been living in Seattle for a while now so I'm getting very used (and attached) to people being friendly and accommodating. Getting on in New York is largely a matter of dealing with throngs of people, which is largely a matter of steadfastly going about your business while they go about theirs.
Tangent: managing New York (or, How To Cross a Street in Paris)
Several years ago, while in Paris and just before crossing straight through the traffic circle that surrounds the Arc de Triomphe, a friend told me that in Germany there is a saying: "To cross a street in Paris, buy a newspaper."
In Paris, there is a cascading model of responsibility when it comes to traffic, and it all has to do with field of vision and eye contact. If you are driving, you are responsible for the car(s) in front of you; the cars behind you are responsible for you. This means that if someone makes a sudden lane change just ahead of you, you are responsible for seeing it and dealing with it. Similarly you can simply dart into another lane and the people you may or may not be cutting off need to deal with that. In situations where line of sight isn't definitive (i.e. if you come to an intersection at the same time as another car), right of way is largely determined by eye contact. If you make eye contact with the other car and they look away, they have the right of way; the idea is that you are watching them, so now you're responsible. So the trick is to simply look away (as diannadinoble would say, "Eyesies closies") and go about your business cutting people off.
So, if you want to cross a street in Paris, buy a newspaper. Again, the idea is that if you open the newspaper and glue your eyes on it while walking blithely into the street, you're making eye contact with nobody while also being directly in their line of site. The theory goes, they have to stop.
The theory works, by the way. And it applies to getting around in New York City. If you want to get through a crowd, make eye contact with nobody and walk. A lot of body language is around intimidation there, and the unfailing way to win the intimidation contest is, frankly, to simply not give a damn about intimidation. I mean, it helps to be taller than other people, but really it just comes down not caring. Stick a 5'4" woman in a thrift store coat on a New York sidewalk and tell her to walk like she means to get somewhere and there's nobody else there, and believe me, some would-be homeboy who thinks eye contact and a sneer is the key is gonna Get Outta The Way.
Chapter two continued (or, So Where Were We?)
We made our way northward and discovered one anomaly of New York: juxtaposition. In such a compact space, there's not really any opportunity for transition. You walk northward through China Town and bango, you're in Little Italy. The weather was bright and clear, if a little cool, so we stopped and had some damn good Italian at a sidewalk cafe.
Figure 1: K's forehead size made more difficult to determine by shadow line in Little Italy
While there, we began assembling the profile of one exemplar of the local fauna: the SNYL, or Scary New York Lady. Basic requirements are wayyyyy too much makeup, fake tan being a nice touch, highlights or blonde dye job a plus, heels too high for the occasion, fairly solipsistic attitude, and the permanent aura that things just aren't quite up to snuff.
We dined next to three SNYLs, one of which refused eat what she ordered because she "just didn't care for it," and assured the very accommodating waiter that really, "I'm not a picky eater." In my book that would mean she's also not a picky payer, but of course this became gratis food. And the dance of nature goes on.
Chapter three: SoHo (or, When Gentrification Attacks)
I had heard of the gentrification of SoHo many years ago. Dire warnings were issued that the hip neighborhood's edge and rooty culture would be steamrolled by the advance of corporately appropriated image machines as chain stores marched in and occupied the whole thing. Now, say what you will about the inevitable evolution of all neighborhoods and communities, because that's exactly what has happened here. SoHo is totally awash with corporations masquerading as hip and trendy boutiques. There are some galleries here and there and had we had the time to dig below the surface I'm certain we would have found a resilient and defiant culture surviving in the dark corners and back streets.
Figure 2: New second-favorite picture of Kristan, giving that are-you-taking-a-picture-of-me look in SoHo
Figure 3: Found object, SoHo
Of course, the reason we were in SoHo was to make a stop at the Apple Store, irony aside. I'd love to bash Apple for jumping on the gentrification wagon here, but (furthering both the irony and Apple's penchant for doing Really Cool Things) their store had the coolest architectural glass elements I've seen in a long time.
Figure 4: Glass stairs
Note that the entire structure is made of glass. Aside from attachment elements, there is no steel or wood support at all. The entire weight of the structure and its load and the sheering shearing prevention is borne by glass. (Listen to me, talking like I know all this stuff. K probably has a much better write-up about all this.) Walking on it is interesting: it vibrates. You definitely get the feeling, "Yup, walking on glass."
And of course, those merciless Apple bastards, once they have something good going, really play it to the hilt.
Figure 5: Glass bridge
Figure 6: Artsy version
Chapter 4: the hotel (or, Pretensions Don't Come Cheap)
We snagged a cab from SoHo up to Times Square to check in and lose our bags. By a fluke of booking mix-ups I had actually stayed in the area a few years before and pretty much written it off as garish and annoying. But then, see, I lack the gene that allows me to appreciate garish things like casinos or the OC, so this really isn't a surprise. K would certainly have a different take on it. And besides, I was starting to get curious about this slick minimalist hotel thing. Since we had effectively desplurged the rest of the trip, this would be our one big splurge, so I figured I might as well enjoy it to the hilt.
And man, the W is smack dab in the middle of Times Square, no questions asked. Walk out the door and you are physically tackled by the screaming lights of the Las Vegas of New York. It was mid-afternoon when we got there, and even then the lighted signs lit the place up. I shudder to think of the electricity wasted on that. Oy.
And then, the W. It's like a concept hotel where it's all about being Slick. The entry is slick with water flowing over a glass ceiling and backlit, making for a pattern of rippling light throughout the foyer. A short elevator ride deposits you in the slick lobby which is lounge-like. Big wide low sofas and projected images on suspended fabric columns and a hip soul beat soundtrack. The staff is all done up in minimalist black, the guys in black slacks and black turtlenecks and charcoal gray sport coats. When they give you your keycards they're inserted in a black paper sleeve with the room number written in silver ink. Slick.
The hotel tower is very narrow and about 50 stories, so there are only a handful of rooms on each floor. We were staying in the rock-bottom price range, so I suspect that the loftier price ranges may net you your own floor.
The rooms are predictably wood and brushed metal and glass affairs. K immediately whipped out her camera and started shooting elements.
Figure 7: Reflexive photograph of reflection of photographer (at left) taking photograph of reflection of photographer (at right) taking photograph, with reflection of photographed photographer (at far right)
She was particularly fascinated with the bathroom. Where it did not offer a high degree of visual privacy, it made up for it with the complete and utter lack of soundproofing so you could be treated to the full multi-media experience of your roommate taking a Cheney.
Figure 8: Shootin' the john
After first impressions, the polish started to wear off startlingly quickly. For starters, the furniture was damaged: one drawer was flat-out broken, there were scratches and gouges in the particle board, chips in the paint, the swivel mirror in the bathroom seemed to have a broken neck and be on the verge of falling off, and there was a whiff of IKEA that clung to everything.
The challenge with minimalism is that flaws quickly become glaring, and that was definitely the case here. The pretense of the joint didn't help matters. Of particular amusement was the fact that they had their own Starbucks-like language for everything. For the non-clued-in visitors from the (snort) Midwest who don't understand that "styling" means "housekeeping," they even included a translation guide.
Figure 9: Venti snooty
Chapter 5: dinner (or, The Mary Poppins Bag of Dining Options)
So after a very brief respite, we once again headed out into the city. I was feeling a bit punchy so we decided to head back down around SoHo to see if we could find a coffee shop. In Seattle, "finding" a coffee shop is a matter of looking either left or right. This turned out to be a bit more of a challenge in NYC.
In German, there's a word, Kenner. A common translation is connoisseur, but this only captures part of it. Kennen is the verb, "to know," not in the sense of knowing math or knowing the answer to a question, but rather being familiar with something. Usage: "I know that guy," or, "I know my way around here," or, "I know New York City." A Kenner, then, is someone who knows the ins and outs, the way around, the secrets, the way of the place. [Edit: K informs me that "to ken" is in common usage in Scotland, used in exactly this sense.] New York is a place for Kenner. We were decidedly Unkenner but having a whole hell of a lot of fun with it.
We wandered off, once again without a map and with only the vaguest of agenda -- coffee shop or reasonable facsimile thereof, and in the general direction of SoHo. I had wanted to see Washington Square park and also maybe the Empire State building, and knew they were both roughly in that direction. So off we went.
Along the way we found it interesting how neighborhoods develop in what would otherwise seem to be a continuum of mid-rise and high-rise buildings. New York is mostly on a grid, and if you say "upper mid-70's on the west side" it means something very particular to a native. We, of course, new nothing of the neighborhoods we were walking through, so it was very interesting to observe the character and feel and neighborhood change from block to block.
We also quickly figured out that walking all the way down to China Town or even SoHo was going to be a bit more than we wanted, especially as it was getting pretty chilly and edging towards sunset to boot. We hadn't yet worked out the subway system (definitely a requirement for next visit). A bicycle rickshaw pedaled past and we figured that would be a hoot, but we couldn't catch up and besides, we would have frozen our asses off. So we went with a taxi which dropped us off right where we had exited the Fung Wah a few hours before.
We spent some more time poking around a bit more deeply into China Town, then followed Broadway north into SoHo. Eventually we found a corner cafe where we nursed respective coffee and chai lattes while indulging in one of the best pass-times in New York City: people watching.
Figure 10: watching reality TV
This is where we started creating our profiles of New York folk. Here the SNYL theory was defined. We also developed the idea of the New York Crank: a person who, in other cities, might be perceived as a kook or even mentally ill, but in New York is right at home and considered tenaciously themselves. Seinfeld's Kramer is probably a good example of this. We had great fun finding these people among the crowds and watching their quirky individualism play itself out.
Also amusing was watching a group of women set up yet another ad hoc street market on the sidewalk along side a couple of other vendors. They were pronouncedly nervous and when a couple of cops stopped and got out of their car, these women had already packed up and scattered down the street throwing nervous looks over their shoulders. In New York fashion their get-away lasted a whole half block before they once again opened up for business, occasionally gophering over the crowd to see if the heat was still on.
We moved on, and K spent some time poking around in shops. As husbands go I make a pretty good shopping partner. I'm also painfully aware that this is like saying the Hummer is a good over-sized SUV: accurate, but way short of adequate. It's worth noting that this was not the only time that our recently departed third was conspicuously absent throughout the trip, perhaps more vividly than in recent weeks because a) we had hoped that she would be along on this trip and b) crazy side trips to NYC would have been just her thing. The lack of Bergen crossed our minds often.
So, yeah. My version of shopping support eventually devolved to standing around outside and shooting pictures. Feh.
Figure 11: Kristan trying on a really cute top
Next up: dinner. This is New York, right, so dinner should be swift to find. Little Italy was close by and a dead lock for good eats, but we were a bit Italianed out, so we decided to -- what else -- improvise. We wandered up Broadway a bit checking out restaurants, and then around Broadway a bit checking out restaurants, and then westward a bit checking out restaurants. Eventually we stumbled across Washington Square park, which was pretty cool, and found ourselves (unwittingly) on the outskirts of Greenwich Village.
By this point we had considered and passed up probably a dozen or more dinner joints. In most other cities we would have found ourselves reconsidering the options we had already seen, but hey: this is New York. There is an endless supply of eateries, especially in The Village. We kept going. Italian places. Indian places. Thai places. Eclectic American places. Ethiopian. Japanese. French. Wash, rinse, repeat. The process of passing up on restaurants slowly became the point itself: on the next block, there will be another half dozen.
Eventually, of course, we found a nice little place and got a great table off in a toasty corner and had a wonderful, relaxed dinner over some pretty fine New York eats.
Figure 12: Kristan in the environs of dinner option number 134
Chapter six: Times Square (or, Would Ya Look At All Them Lumens)
After dinner, it was back to the hotel. On foot. We wandered up through Washington Square park again. (I have no photos of this, which is a bit irksome. It's the park with the monument to Washington that's essentially a replica of the Arc de Triomphe.) Then, on a whim, just kept going.
Another observation on New York mannerisms as antithesis to those of Seattle: crossing against Don't Walk signals is as expected as opening a door before going through it. In fact, when stopping at a street to wait for cross traffic most pedestrians don't wait on the curb, but stand in a tacitly agreed upon buffer zone that extends out roughly as far as the width of a car. The typical stance is to step out into that zone, then turn with your head facing traffic to judge when you can step into the space directly behind the last car before a gap in traffic.
This is so common that another coping mechanism has evolved around it: New York drivers, seeing the pedestrian lurking in the Pedestrian Buffer Zone (PBZ), will actually honk to remind them that 2 tons of steel directed by a New Yorker in a hurry is bearing down on them. This compensates for the tendency of some pedestrians to look not only for gaps in traffic, but cars that seem like they could be bullied into stopping regardless of traffic signals.
We witnessed a variation on this during the trek up to Times Square. Two natives, classic New York Jews clad in black, were pushing a black baby stroller along in front of them. They were deeply involved in conversation and walking at a fast clip. When they got to streets they would step directly into the PBZ and push the stroller part way into traffic, edging forward a bit if they thought they could nose their way into traffic. Their whole stance was one of nonchalance. I have no doubt that if I had said, "Whoa, guys, you're pushing that stroller into traffic," they would have replied, "Yeah, and what's it to ya?"
Times Square at night is a monument to either wanton electricity usage, or capitalism run amok. Actually, both. In fact, there is an obvious competition to achieve the superlative in gratuitous marketing hype by way of maximal megawattage. And it's all flashing and blinking and changing colors and moving and blinking and changing and flashing and scrolling and blinking and flashing. And everything is written with an exclamation point! Even the Red Lobster there is exclamatory! And it's crawling with tourists, too! Everyone gawks upward, and you can hardly move! It's very annoying!
Figure 13: K, along with a few dozen thousand other non-New Yorkers
And then, sleep. Imagine, a whole other day follows this one.
Embracing the lack of structure the weekend afforded, I said, "I dunno."
"Well, we could always go to New York."
I reflected on this. We had always wanted to get down to The City while we were in Boston, but as often happens when living in a city or region for a while we had become a bit jaded to the notion. It had just never happened in the five-plus years we lived in Boston. "Um. Okay," I said.
Now, I've managed to see a lot of my old, abandoned friends while out in Boston a couple of times before. But this time I got a little too caught up in the silly details of my life to alert said friends to this particular trip to this particular seaboard, so a couple of them were caught completely unawares. It was down to last-minute planning to see any of them at all and and I have to say, skating off to New York really enhanced those efforts greatly. Some friend I am.
The whole thing was a completely spur-of-the-moment thing (which, really, is one of the best ways to find yourself in New York, I should think). "Life," as K and I so very often remind each other, "is an adventure."
Prologue: a disclaimer (or, Why This Goes On and On and On)
I'm not much on journaling as journaling, and as you probably know, I feel I owe you reader(s) of my journal pretty much nothing. Long stretches of time pass between my entries because, well, I wanna. And when they do come along it's usually me grousing about how Amtrak doesn't know how to configure its web server or some such trivial fluff. This one's kind of different. I figure I'll come back and read this one, so I'm writing more for my memory than for your enjoyment. I mean, not like I consider your enjoyment when I'm writing on here anyway, right? But this time, even less so. If you're not up for detailed descriptions of a New York neophyte's trip, now would be a good time to go read the Ironic Times or something.
Chapter one: logistics (or, The Quickest Way To Find Out What's At The Bottom Of A Cliff)
Aside from figuring out how to not end up seeing many of our friends, the first order of business was to figure out how to get there on short notice. Plan A was the train, but it turned out to be a bit more expensive than we thought, overbooked, and besides which Amtrak suspended service that day (narrowly dodged a bullet there). Plan B was flying down to minimize sitting-on-our-ass time and maximize city-gawking time, but that turned out to be twice the price of the already expensive train (and once we found ourselves looking at connecting flights the whole ass-sitting-avoidance thing was out the window). Renting a car seemed like a good plan C, except for one, none of the rental places would be open on Sunday to return the damn thing and for two, the car rental web sites are so laughably poorly designed that I was rapidly losing my temper just trying to get the damn things to work. Stupid web sites. Hire a usability person and listen to them, for the sake of fuck.
Anyway.
Plan D was the Fung Wah Bus at a heady $30 round trip. The Fung Wah was born of a gray-market transportation system between the respective China Towns of Boston and New York. It was sketchy to the point of bordering on human smuggling. rubyred660 actually took one of these down to NYC in its early days and described it as decrepit van with no seat belts, where they shoved you bodily in and if your bag didn't fit on your lap, it didn't go. There was a single whirlwind pit-stop at some location in Connecticut and, she said, "They don't take a head count so if you miss it, you're S.O.L." unsound didn't have personal experience as a passenger but let us know that, "Those things haul ass," having been passed by one on the highway.
I get oddly nervous on speeding buses as it is, so the prospect of clinging to my bag in a vehicle where the seats may or may not be securely bolted down careening through Boston-New York traffic was a wee bit uninviting. But it had four things going for it. One, price. Two, available tickets and reservations (which already sounded incongruously sophisticated, since rubyred660 had told us that the "ticket office" was a closet-sized hole somewhere in China Town). Three, price. And four, it was so delightfully improvised and shady.
Then came the question of lodgings. This too had to be last-second. While I was busy cursing the car rental web sites (like they aren't thoroughly cursed already), Kristan started looking at where we could spend the night. For a while now she's been wanting to stay at the W Hotel -- kind of a sleek, minimalist upscale affair. Once we figured we would be saving a bundle on transportation (and also because the precious few available rooms for that night were literally disappearing between mouse clicks), we decided to splurge a bit and go with the W. And, since K gamely dedicated herself to being shamelessly touristy, we reserved a room in Times Square. Famously sketchy transportation to unnecessarily glitzy lodgings. Perfect.
And just like that, there was no turning back. Crikey.
Chapter two: the trip down (or, Them Chinese Drive A Damn Fine Bus)
Up at the crack of dawn, packed light, moving fast. We had thought the pick-up point was China Town, but the web site said Boston's South Station. Fair 'nuff. We braced ourselves for what would certainly prove to be one of the best anecdotes of the trip: the infamous Fung Wah Bus.
So, our expectations were betrayed almost from the get-go. For starters, we weren't lurking down some dark alleyway in China Town, waiting for the vehicle to lurch to a stop and some noisy Chinese broad to plant her hands on my ass and shove me head-first into it, plopping a chicken on my lap before I could get my bearings. Instead, this was an honest to goodness bus station. Granted, the ticketing process was somewhat ad hoc affair and the guy running the door resembled nothing more than a Mandarin bouncer, but still. It was all very clean and efficient and on the level.
We knew that in the meantime Fung Wah had actually gone and bought themselves some actual buses, but since prices hadn't changed we figured these were going to be broken-down Soviet-surplus-grade Greyhound rejects that passed vehicle inspection only by piping part of the exhaust into the passenger compartment. As we stood there half dreading and half relishing the impending arrival of our stupendously iffy ride, we elbowed each other as a nice new shiny comfy bus came around the corner. "Yeah, that's us, huh?" we joked.
And of course, it was. The Fung Wah had gone legit. The bus was great. Comfy seats that recline, air conditioning with individual vents, reading lights, functioning brakes even. The ride was speedy and smooth and aside from a traffic jam in Connecticut (apparently New York's biggest item of export is traffic) efficient and thoroughly enjoyable.
Huh.
Chapter three: arrival (or, Putting My East Coast Training To Use)
I've been to NYC several times before, mostly business trips and all very brief excursions with minimal chance for actual checking out the place. K had been there a few times before as well and had a resident New Yorker to show her around a bit, so between us we knew enough to get us into trouble. But aside from that we hadn't really gone delving in the city built to be delved, so if any of this seems kind of naive, you know why.
The Fung Wah disgorged us at the base of the Manhattan bridge, on the cusp of China Town. The only thing we had resembling a plan was the fact that we needed to check into our hotel at some point, which would also relieve us of our bags. We hadn't so much as bought or even consulted a map of New York City. Thus we had the first of many, "What now?" moments. Faced with a myriad of choices the parameters of which were themselves not clear, having not yet discussed our goals or success metrics for the trip, and lacking any guiding principles or even so much as a map, we proceeded in the most wise and productive manner possible under the circumstances: we wandered off in search of whatever.
Specifically this led us along West Canal Street and into the throngs of China Town. As coffee shops are to Seattle, so ad hoc street vendors are to New York City sidewalks. And when I say ad hoc I mean "definitely off the books, somewhere between gray and black market, and quite possibly a simple fence for stolen goods." The streets of China Town are packed with these things: people hawking obviously illicit DVD's ("DVD! DVD! DVD!" chant the peddlers); cheap knock-off purses; cheap knock-off watches; cheap knock-off sunglasses; plastic jewelry of all sorts; t-shirts and other touristy goo-gahs. Some guys lurked about holding brief cases with eyes darting about, trying to conspicuously inconspicuously make eye contact to spark the famous, "Hey buddy, you looking for a [thing]?" conversation. The shops themselves were alternately aimed at tourists (t-shirts, trinkets), natives (all manner of goods stacked to the ceiling and waiting to be haggled over), and the residents of China Town (who knows what, except it was labeled in Chinese and strewn about in what appeared to be a haphazard fashion that was obviously deliberate in its own inscrutable way).
The sidewalks teemed with people. I've been living in Seattle for a while now so I'm getting very used (and attached) to people being friendly and accommodating. Getting on in New York is largely a matter of dealing with throngs of people, which is largely a matter of steadfastly going about your business while they go about theirs.
Tangent: managing New York (or, How To Cross a Street in Paris)
Several years ago, while in Paris and just before crossing straight through the traffic circle that surrounds the Arc de Triomphe, a friend told me that in Germany there is a saying: "To cross a street in Paris, buy a newspaper."
In Paris, there is a cascading model of responsibility when it comes to traffic, and it all has to do with field of vision and eye contact. If you are driving, you are responsible for the car(s) in front of you; the cars behind you are responsible for you. This means that if someone makes a sudden lane change just ahead of you, you are responsible for seeing it and dealing with it. Similarly you can simply dart into another lane and the people you may or may not be cutting off need to deal with that. In situations where line of sight isn't definitive (i.e. if you come to an intersection at the same time as another car), right of way is largely determined by eye contact. If you make eye contact with the other car and they look away, they have the right of way; the idea is that you are watching them, so now you're responsible. So the trick is to simply look away (as diannadinoble would say, "Eyesies closies") and go about your business cutting people off.
So, if you want to cross a street in Paris, buy a newspaper. Again, the idea is that if you open the newspaper and glue your eyes on it while walking blithely into the street, you're making eye contact with nobody while also being directly in their line of site. The theory goes, they have to stop.
The theory works, by the way. And it applies to getting around in New York City. If you want to get through a crowd, make eye contact with nobody and walk. A lot of body language is around intimidation there, and the unfailing way to win the intimidation contest is, frankly, to simply not give a damn about intimidation. I mean, it helps to be taller than other people, but really it just comes down not caring. Stick a 5'4" woman in a thrift store coat on a New York sidewalk and tell her to walk like she means to get somewhere and there's nobody else there, and believe me, some would-be homeboy who thinks eye contact and a sneer is the key is gonna Get Outta The Way.
Chapter two continued (or, So Where Were We?)
We made our way northward and discovered one anomaly of New York: juxtaposition. In such a compact space, there's not really any opportunity for transition. You walk northward through China Town and bango, you're in Little Italy. The weather was bright and clear, if a little cool, so we stopped and had some damn good Italian at a sidewalk cafe.
Figure 1: K's forehead size made more difficult to determine by shadow line in Little Italy
While there, we began assembling the profile of one exemplar of the local fauna: the SNYL, or Scary New York Lady. Basic requirements are wayyyyy too much makeup, fake tan being a nice touch, highlights or blonde dye job a plus, heels too high for the occasion, fairly solipsistic attitude, and the permanent aura that things just aren't quite up to snuff.
We dined next to three SNYLs, one of which refused eat what she ordered because she "just didn't care for it," and assured the very accommodating waiter that really, "I'm not a picky eater." In my book that would mean she's also not a picky payer, but of course this became gratis food. And the dance of nature goes on.
Chapter three: SoHo (or, When Gentrification Attacks)
I had heard of the gentrification of SoHo many years ago. Dire warnings were issued that the hip neighborhood's edge and rooty culture would be steamrolled by the advance of corporately appropriated image machines as chain stores marched in and occupied the whole thing. Now, say what you will about the inevitable evolution of all neighborhoods and communities, because that's exactly what has happened here. SoHo is totally awash with corporations masquerading as hip and trendy boutiques. There are some galleries here and there and had we had the time to dig below the surface I'm certain we would have found a resilient and defiant culture surviving in the dark corners and back streets.
Figure 2: New second-favorite picture of Kristan, giving that are-you-taking-a-picture-of-me look in SoHo
Figure 3: Found object, SoHo
Of course, the reason we were in SoHo was to make a stop at the Apple Store, irony aside. I'd love to bash Apple for jumping on the gentrification wagon here, but (furthering both the irony and Apple's penchant for doing Really Cool Things) their store had the coolest architectural glass elements I've seen in a long time.
Figure 4: Glass stairs
Note that the entire structure is made of glass. Aside from attachment elements, there is no steel or wood support at all. The entire weight of the structure and its load and the sheering shearing prevention is borne by glass. (Listen to me, talking like I know all this stuff. K probably has a much better write-up about all this.) Walking on it is interesting: it vibrates. You definitely get the feeling, "Yup, walking on glass."
And of course, those merciless Apple bastards, once they have something good going, really play it to the hilt.
Figure 5: Glass bridge
Figure 6: Artsy version
Chapter 4: the hotel (or, Pretensions Don't Come Cheap)
We snagged a cab from SoHo up to Times Square to check in and lose our bags. By a fluke of booking mix-ups I had actually stayed in the area a few years before and pretty much written it off as garish and annoying. But then, see, I lack the gene that allows me to appreciate garish things like casinos or the OC, so this really isn't a surprise. K would certainly have a different take on it. And besides, I was starting to get curious about this slick minimalist hotel thing. Since we had effectively desplurged the rest of the trip, this would be our one big splurge, so I figured I might as well enjoy it to the hilt.
And man, the W is smack dab in the middle of Times Square, no questions asked. Walk out the door and you are physically tackled by the screaming lights of the Las Vegas of New York. It was mid-afternoon when we got there, and even then the lighted signs lit the place up. I shudder to think of the electricity wasted on that. Oy.
And then, the W. It's like a concept hotel where it's all about being Slick. The entry is slick with water flowing over a glass ceiling and backlit, making for a pattern of rippling light throughout the foyer. A short elevator ride deposits you in the slick lobby which is lounge-like. Big wide low sofas and projected images on suspended fabric columns and a hip soul beat soundtrack. The staff is all done up in minimalist black, the guys in black slacks and black turtlenecks and charcoal gray sport coats. When they give you your keycards they're inserted in a black paper sleeve with the room number written in silver ink. Slick.
The hotel tower is very narrow and about 50 stories, so there are only a handful of rooms on each floor. We were staying in the rock-bottom price range, so I suspect that the loftier price ranges may net you your own floor.
The rooms are predictably wood and brushed metal and glass affairs. K immediately whipped out her camera and started shooting elements.
Figure 7: Reflexive photograph of reflection of photographer (at left) taking photograph of reflection of photographer (at right) taking photograph, with reflection of photographed photographer (at far right)
She was particularly fascinated with the bathroom. Where it did not offer a high degree of visual privacy, it made up for it with the complete and utter lack of soundproofing so you could be treated to the full multi-media experience of your roommate taking a Cheney.
Figure 8: Shootin' the john
After first impressions, the polish started to wear off startlingly quickly. For starters, the furniture was damaged: one drawer was flat-out broken, there were scratches and gouges in the particle board, chips in the paint, the swivel mirror in the bathroom seemed to have a broken neck and be on the verge of falling off, and there was a whiff of IKEA that clung to everything.
The challenge with minimalism is that flaws quickly become glaring, and that was definitely the case here. The pretense of the joint didn't help matters. Of particular amusement was the fact that they had their own Starbucks-like language for everything. For the non-clued-in visitors from the (snort) Midwest who don't understand that "styling" means "housekeeping," they even included a translation guide.
Figure 9: Venti snooty
Chapter 5: dinner (or, The Mary Poppins Bag of Dining Options)
So after a very brief respite, we once again headed out into the city. I was feeling a bit punchy so we decided to head back down around SoHo to see if we could find a coffee shop. In Seattle, "finding" a coffee shop is a matter of looking either left or right. This turned out to be a bit more of a challenge in NYC.
In German, there's a word, Kenner. A common translation is connoisseur, but this only captures part of it. Kennen is the verb, "to know," not in the sense of knowing math or knowing the answer to a question, but rather being familiar with something. Usage: "I know that guy," or, "I know my way around here," or, "I know New York City." A Kenner, then, is someone who knows the ins and outs, the way around, the secrets, the way of the place. [Edit: K informs me that "to ken" is in common usage in Scotland, used in exactly this sense.] New York is a place for Kenner. We were decidedly Unkenner but having a whole hell of a lot of fun with it.
We wandered off, once again without a map and with only the vaguest of agenda -- coffee shop or reasonable facsimile thereof, and in the general direction of SoHo. I had wanted to see Washington Square park and also maybe the Empire State building, and knew they were both roughly in that direction. So off we went.
Along the way we found it interesting how neighborhoods develop in what would otherwise seem to be a continuum of mid-rise and high-rise buildings. New York is mostly on a grid, and if you say "upper mid-70's on the west side" it means something very particular to a native. We, of course, new nothing of the neighborhoods we were walking through, so it was very interesting to observe the character and feel and neighborhood change from block to block.
We also quickly figured out that walking all the way down to China Town or even SoHo was going to be a bit more than we wanted, especially as it was getting pretty chilly and edging towards sunset to boot. We hadn't yet worked out the subway system (definitely a requirement for next visit). A bicycle rickshaw pedaled past and we figured that would be a hoot, but we couldn't catch up and besides, we would have frozen our asses off. So we went with a taxi which dropped us off right where we had exited the Fung Wah a few hours before.
We spent some more time poking around a bit more deeply into China Town, then followed Broadway north into SoHo. Eventually we found a corner cafe where we nursed respective coffee and chai lattes while indulging in one of the best pass-times in New York City: people watching.
Figure 10: watching reality TV
This is where we started creating our profiles of New York folk. Here the SNYL theory was defined. We also developed the idea of the New York Crank: a person who, in other cities, might be perceived as a kook or even mentally ill, but in New York is right at home and considered tenaciously themselves. Seinfeld's Kramer is probably a good example of this. We had great fun finding these people among the crowds and watching their quirky individualism play itself out.
Also amusing was watching a group of women set up yet another ad hoc street market on the sidewalk along side a couple of other vendors. They were pronouncedly nervous and when a couple of cops stopped and got out of their car, these women had already packed up and scattered down the street throwing nervous looks over their shoulders. In New York fashion their get-away lasted a whole half block before they once again opened up for business, occasionally gophering over the crowd to see if the heat was still on.
We moved on, and K spent some time poking around in shops. As husbands go I make a pretty good shopping partner. I'm also painfully aware that this is like saying the Hummer is a good over-sized SUV: accurate, but way short of adequate. It's worth noting that this was not the only time that our recently departed third was conspicuously absent throughout the trip, perhaps more vividly than in recent weeks because a) we had hoped that she would be along on this trip and b) crazy side trips to NYC would have been just her thing. The lack of Bergen crossed our minds often.
So, yeah. My version of shopping support eventually devolved to standing around outside and shooting pictures. Feh.
Figure 11: Kristan trying on a really cute top
Next up: dinner. This is New York, right, so dinner should be swift to find. Little Italy was close by and a dead lock for good eats, but we were a bit Italianed out, so we decided to -- what else -- improvise. We wandered up Broadway a bit checking out restaurants, and then around Broadway a bit checking out restaurants, and then westward a bit checking out restaurants. Eventually we stumbled across Washington Square park, which was pretty cool, and found ourselves (unwittingly) on the outskirts of Greenwich Village.
By this point we had considered and passed up probably a dozen or more dinner joints. In most other cities we would have found ourselves reconsidering the options we had already seen, but hey: this is New York. There is an endless supply of eateries, especially in The Village. We kept going. Italian places. Indian places. Thai places. Eclectic American places. Ethiopian. Japanese. French. Wash, rinse, repeat. The process of passing up on restaurants slowly became the point itself: on the next block, there will be another half dozen.
Eventually, of course, we found a nice little place and got a great table off in a toasty corner and had a wonderful, relaxed dinner over some pretty fine New York eats.
Figure 12: Kristan in the environs of dinner option number 134
Chapter six: Times Square (or, Would Ya Look At All Them Lumens)
After dinner, it was back to the hotel. On foot. We wandered up through Washington Square park again. (I have no photos of this, which is a bit irksome. It's the park with the monument to Washington that's essentially a replica of the Arc de Triomphe.) Then, on a whim, just kept going.
Another observation on New York mannerisms as antithesis to those of Seattle: crossing against Don't Walk signals is as expected as opening a door before going through it. In fact, when stopping at a street to wait for cross traffic most pedestrians don't wait on the curb, but stand in a tacitly agreed upon buffer zone that extends out roughly as far as the width of a car. The typical stance is to step out into that zone, then turn with your head facing traffic to judge when you can step into the space directly behind the last car before a gap in traffic.
This is so common that another coping mechanism has evolved around it: New York drivers, seeing the pedestrian lurking in the Pedestrian Buffer Zone (PBZ), will actually honk to remind them that 2 tons of steel directed by a New Yorker in a hurry is bearing down on them. This compensates for the tendency of some pedestrians to look not only for gaps in traffic, but cars that seem like they could be bullied into stopping regardless of traffic signals.
We witnessed a variation on this during the trek up to Times Square. Two natives, classic New York Jews clad in black, were pushing a black baby stroller along in front of them. They were deeply involved in conversation and walking at a fast clip. When they got to streets they would step directly into the PBZ and push the stroller part way into traffic, edging forward a bit if they thought they could nose their way into traffic. Their whole stance was one of nonchalance. I have no doubt that if I had said, "Whoa, guys, you're pushing that stroller into traffic," they would have replied, "Yeah, and what's it to ya?"
Times Square at night is a monument to either wanton electricity usage, or capitalism run amok. Actually, both. In fact, there is an obvious competition to achieve the superlative in gratuitous marketing hype by way of maximal megawattage. And it's all flashing and blinking and changing colors and moving and blinking and changing and flashing and scrolling and blinking and flashing. And everything is written with an exclamation point! Even the Red Lobster there is exclamatory! And it's crawling with tourists, too! Everyone gawks upward, and you can hardly move! It's very annoying!
Figure 13: K, along with a few dozen thousand other non-New Yorkers
And then, sleep. Imagine, a whole other day follows this one.