New York City's Jewel

Central Park - I will just let it speak for its self!

One of the many walkways in Central Park.

Concrete character creations.

 This is the famous "Engagement Bridge" 
used in films like Enchanted.

A little glimpse of the lake. Don't ask me which one. Unfortunately, you can't see the water lilies.

Lots of statues, this one is called the Falconer. In my other life I think I would have liked to have been one!

Strawberry Hills (forever)? I don't see any strawberries!

 

When you leave the park on the west side at 72nd Street, you see this little gem of a building. This is the Dakota Building, where John Lennon lived.

 

My Neighborhood

I wrote about where I live, now I will show you some sites around my neighborhood. To the east of me is the Grant Projects. Silly me - I thought there was only one. Come to find out there are many around New York, especially in the Harlem area. It is considered City Assisted Housing. I was told that if you look at a Google Earth map, you can identify the buildings because they are built in a certain formation. I also was told there weren't any south of Harlem area, but I found one down in the Chelsea district yesterday.

To the south of me is Sakura Park, it technically is on the same block. I took a nap on the park bench today.

You still hear the noise of the city, but it was a bit diffused.

It is warm today, and there was a 

nice breeze coming up from the Hudson River.

And just south of the park is Riverside Church.

It is HUGE! It takes up a whole block, and is considered the largest church in the U.S.A. It is Gothic construction - and my pictures do not do it justice. I have to go back on another day and take pictures of the chapel - still haven't seen that. A few Sundays ago, when I was returning from church, there were lots of the African-American's walking from somewhere, dressed in very fine Sunday attire. At that time I didn't know where they were walking from - but it was Riverside Church. I am going to go to their services - but I only have three Sundays left to make it there!

This is a view of the inside of the hallway! Sorry it is blurry!

It is a beautiful building - lots of stone and lots of wood.

I took a video while I was standing in front of it.

This building is right across the street.

It is some other church!

To the west is Grant's Tomb and the Hudson River. 

It is a very impressive mausoleum and memorial to a great general and statesman. History says that before he died he requested to be buried in New York, not Washington D.C. The funeral procession took over five hours with a million people coming to pay their respects.

The insides of the mausoleum reminds me of Napoleon's tomb.All in marble, no decorations. It is quiet and reverent.

Pres. Grant and his wife Julia, are laid to rest in 

red granite coffins in the middle of the circular room.

Because of the lighting, you don't see Pres. Grant's name inscribed on the coffin.

There are niches in the wall surrounding the coffins which contain busts of Grant's generals during the Civil War.

 

 

 This is the walkway to Grant's tomb.

  Around the perimeter of the Mausoleum they have these mosaic tiled benches. Doesn't quite fit into the landscape!

 And walking across the street, you have views like this.

New Jersey is on the other shore. 

To the north - it is How I Travel.

NEWS ALERT - My posts will not be chronological!

Thought I would add a little history lesson to my Blog. This is considered one of my experiences - the history of blogging! Also - I am going to start blogging about the random things I am doing and not be bogged down by doing it order. Maybe that will encourage me to get these experiences online faster! And just for your FYI - I did a report on "flogging" across America.

Homework in NYC - Really?

While here - I am taking a class on International Media. Our first assignment that we have turned in, was to interview a person at I-House, of the country we will be doing a presentation and research paper on. So I was able to interview two young women from India.

We had three questions that we were to ask:

• What are the differences between America and India, the challenges, things you missed or any annoyances.
• How is the media different or the same from your country.
• What advice would you give someone visiting your country.

Ana is from the Bengali district of India and was graduating with her masters in software engineering. She completed her undergraduate in India. Her father is a pediatrician and her sister is an engineer for Google in India. She was leaving in a week for Santa Monica, working at Yahoo. I visited Ana while she was preparing a Chicken Curry dish for her aunt and uncle that were in town visiting. I didn’t have the “list” of questions with me, so I just visited with her.

During our conversation, I didn’t gather that she was annoyed, nor indifferent to the American lifestyle. She spoke of being able to adjust to any type of people or situations, and was looking forward to her time in California. When asking if she would seek others from Indian background she said that if she came across others, then yes she would spend time with them. But I could sense that she was looking for some new adventures and experiences.

I specifically asked Ana about the media outlets in India, and in particular, about Bollywood. She chuckled. She said that in each region of India there was a “Bollywood.” Bollywood was for those of the Hindu religion, and that for each region and religion, they had their own producers of film. She was Bengalese, and said that in her region, the films were just as big and popular.

Ana said that print media was very popular, lots of small newspapers were printed each day, and the citizens were avid readers. Interesting fact she shared was that the south and east areas of India had literacy rates of 90+ percent.

My next interview was with Prateedi. I was more direct in my questions with her. She loves NYC, especially the public transportation system and the opportunity she has as a woman to excel in her profession, a culinary chef. She hasn’t found it difficult to adapt to the American lifestyle.

However she does find it disconcerting that when meeting new people, particularly Americans, they are ignorant and have this “Aladdin” mindset of what and how people are from India. Their ignorance is manifested when talking with them. If it doesn’t directly affect them, here and now, they are not interested. She also felt they had little understanding of global issues. Case in point – the tsunami that destroyed Sri Lanka. They really don’t care because it wasn’t in their backyard!

Prateedi also commented about the literacy rate of people in India – everyone reads and subscribes or buys up to three newspapers a day. She felt that their news was well written and had in depth news. Accordingly, the different newspapers are written in ways that reflected the financial backing or agenda of its owners, both with sensational news and coverage of serious political issues. The same with TV, lots of stations with lots of news. One major difference in their broadcast news was that many stations would have an hour long program of world news, with ties into local situations. She felt that the U.S. news only covered what was happening here locally.

Trying to get a feel for how movies play in the social and economics of India, she chuckled as well. Movies are very integrated in the lives of the Indian people. Everyone watches movies she said. There are stories of Muslim men falling in love with Hindu women and vice-a-versa. Tragic stories, documentaries – just good stories. I asked her if watching these movies, would I get a sense of what life in India was like. She said that many of the movies are exaggerated, they are not realistic. The purpose of movies is for entertainment about interesting people within their different cultures.

When asked what she would suggest to do if visiting her country, her eyes lit up! She commented that the touristy spots are wonderful and that people should go see them, but tourists need to explore more. She suggested that they go to rural areas to see how people live day to day. Unfortunately, she said that the “mindset” people have of India, such as poverty issues, are all people will see when they visit – and that they miss seeing the normal people of India. The Modern India of today, how it has progressed and improved. Apparently, the Indian people are proud of the improvements they have made in their living conditions and they would like others to see this whole new world of theirs. She mentioned that visitors need to go with an open mind, meet people and hear their stories. And most importantly – eat the food!

           

           

MoMA

Leesa had found out that the MoMA (museum of Modern Art) had free admission for Friday night, courtesy of Target stores, so we and five others met up and toured the museum. The two guys that went with us admitted before we went to see everything, that they knew nothing about modern art, and what they did know they didn’t like! They got a different impression when the few pieces that we saw were Van Gough’s, one being Starry, Starry Night. It doesn’t look much different than the posters and prints that are mass produced – but this was the real thing. The painting was covered in glass, and we could go nose to nose with it, much different than my experience in the Geddes Museum. But it was real.

 This is Ted - the unbeliever of Modern Art! 

I like modern art. I like the textures, the forms, the designs – the ability to see art in different ways. Many pieces were ‘out of the box.’ That was OK, I was able to see the beauty in them. However, there was only one room in which a very quick walk through was all it deserved!

 A masterpiece - out of duct tape!

 Metal Sculpture.

 Construction paper weaved together - who would have known

this would be Modern Art! 

Moms - hold onto your child's artwork!!!

 Miniature masterpieces in wire.

 A popular Modern Art piece.

 A whole new concept to eating food that is lighter than air - how about eating out of something made out of feathers?

 This is titled "Fat Cat"

 Hanging from the rafters

  They had some very large pieces of Monet, one was Reflection of Clouds on the Lily-Pond. 

 Then they had a number of paintings of another 

famous artist, Andy Warhol.

Here are few other things I found interesting, like the following - TYPOGRAPHY! I just finished a class in Print Publishing, so "print" is interesting to me.

Then there is furniture design - which is considered Modern Art - so this is for you Kate - even though my pixs don't do it justice, nor did I capture it all!

 Exhibition of South African music artists.

.An exhibit of Picasso's experiement of guitars.

 

 Not a great picture - but a quilt!

And yes, a block of bales of hay.

I am still wondering about this!!!

Afterwards we all visited a Thai restaurant a few blocks away, Pongsri. It was delicious! In fact if I could get some others to go back – we will. There were seven of us, and we all ordered a different dish and shared family style. We had yellow, green, gang sub-pa-rod, and masaman curry, pad thai, and a couple of other dishes. Yum! Leesa ordered one that was hot and spicy. Silly me for even trying!