Eccentric Flower:199908/Zero Visibility and other stories II

More of the same. You have been warned.

This part is mostly about Sunday.

Riese Must Die

At various times on the trip I noticed that a company named Riese Restaurants has apparently made a business of buying chain-restaurant names and tossing these restaurants all over NYC without any concern for common decency whatsoever. They own a bunch of names (Dunkin' Donuts, Roy Rogers, T.G.I. Friday's, Lindy's - how can you license Lindy's? My heart weeps - and quite a few others).

Not only do they have no concept of saturation (There's a section of Times Square that has three Friday's, each within three blocks of the other two), but they seem to figure that if they have a chunk of real estate, they can make more money by dividing it into three separate, completely unrelated restaurants. Thus the prepondrance of little tiny Friday's outlets which just happen to have a little tiny Dunkin' Donuts and a little tiny Roy Rogers next to them.

I had no choice but to boycott them. Fortunately none of these are restaurants I am the least bit interested in patronizing anyway.

I note that there's a Friday's somewhere around 50th in Times Square which boasts that it is the "Largest Friday's in America!" That's, um, a dubious honor at best.

Covert Tourism

I got up at 7:45 on Sunday morning, before my alarm went off at eight. I was determined to get up early. You see, I was about to do Touristy Things and I wanted to minimize the chances of being caught in the act.

In fact - compounding my felony - I was not only going to do touristy things, I had actually planned them out the night before, figuring out the best route to take. This is rather unlike me!

I dislike being a tourist because I feel (perhaps irrationally) that tourism is what's causing the Disneyizing of America. Sure, I like to see new things, but I don't believe that one should expect to see sanitized spectacle wherever one goes. I am a firm believer that when in Rome, one should have a look at what the Romans are doing and try to blend in. Not only will you see things that are more interesting than what's on the package tours, but you'll probably have a better time.

Mind you, I am not planning on taking a trip to the Amazon anytime soon. In fact, I'm not even planning to go to some parts of Asia because I'm not sure I can handle the idea of using squat toilets. But I have done the legwork and I know my limitations. In my book, it's better to avoid going someplace because you don't think you can handle the local conditions than to go to Cambodia with the misguided notion that there will be a sit-down toilet, or even indoor plumbing, in most of the houses - which is what Americans tend to do, assume everyone does it the same way they do. This is why America has become so bland in places the tourists go.

Kreme Meme, Part Two

It was not lost on me that since my hotel was close to the A train, I could take it down to 23rd street, get out, walk a block to the 1 train's station, and continue on that the rest of the way downtown.

Of course, my hotel was close to the 1 train too, so I could have just taken that all the way down; but as has already been mentioned, there's a Krispy Kreme on 23rd, and it happens to be right between the blue and red subway lines, in that very same block. What a coincidence!

You may find it significant that I had to look up the location of many famous landmarks in town, but I still remembered exactly where that Krispy Kreme was from my last trip. I plead the fifth.

I paid for my three donuts, though. Due to subway work, the trains were letting people off in that area but not picking them up (don't ask), and I had to take a train uptown to Penn Station just so I could get back down to South Ferry.

South Ferry

I have long wondered at the fact that only the first five cars of a given train open at South Ferry (which is at the very tip of Manhattan and the end of the subway line). I figured the station was just short; after all, there can't be much real estate available there.

It's not only short, it's sharply curved. In fact, it's curved enough that the platform can't come up to the cars. (Draw an octagon inside a circle and you'll see what I mean.) There are big, unacceptably big gaps between the cars and the platform edge. So they have these gap-filling machines which slide out to meet the cars when the cars stop. It's very odd.

These machines mean that South Ferry is the only subway station in Manhattan where the cars must stop with their doors in specific, predefined positions every time. Since the system is not computerized, this means the driver must watch two monitors hanging from the platform to line the doors up properly with the gap-fillers.

Red Cube

I was in Battery Park to visit the Statue of Liberty. Unfortunately the Park Service is now letting only the first ferryload of the day climb up to the crown. (I believe they're worried that too much traffic will cause structural stress.) I looked at the signs which said to allow 2 hours for the round trip - you have to visit Ellis Island too, whether you care to or not - and I said to myself, "Why on earth would I waste 2 hours if I'm not going to be able to climb to the crown?" So I didn't.

Instead I started walking uptown toward the World Trade Center. The WTC is quite easy to find. Just look up and head toward the towers!

Along the way, I saw a plaza a block over with a sculpture that looked like a giant red cube, balanced on one corner, with a hole drilled through its center. My guidebook notes the names of every major public sculpture in Manhattan, so I told myself to look up the name of the sculpture later. And so I did.

The name of the sculpture is "Red Cube."

Anticlimactic, but impossible to find fault with.

Zero Visibility

They had signs. They had a person standing around warning visitors. "Zero visibility, people! That means you can't see anything!" No refunds. Was I going to pay $12.50 to not see anything?

Of course I was. I got at least $12.50's worth of observations out of it. My kind of observations are not necessarily conducted through a window.

Before you can go up 107 stories in a big hurry, you have to go through a metal detector, have your bag opened and examined, and your hand stamped. "My goodness, they're paranoid here," I thought. After all, this is only an office building.

Then I remembered the bombings. Oh, yeah. Once bitten twice shy.

The observation floor is thoroughly theme-parked. Before you go up, they take your photo. When you get up there, you walk around it in a certain direction, planned so that you finish up at the gift shop. If you're an average visitor, you will reach the gift shop right as they are putting your photo into one of the slots in the display rack. And when they recognize you from the photo, they will beseech you to buy prints.

I walk fast and I wasn't following the usual order of things, so they missed me.

Did you know Kodak owns a view? You bet. There's one window on the deck that has a sign hanging over it: Photo Spot, presented by Kodak. Putting aside the ramifications of sponsoring a view, what was so special about that one particular window? Looking down (you could see the buildings below on the street, but nothing else) I realized by deduction what it was: The window was the one with the best view for photos of the Statue of Liberty. Had it been visible, that is.

I stopped to send a Message to the Stars. These are little booths where you can write or choose a message which will be "transmitted at the end of the nightly rooftop light show," according to the screen. In what code, I do not know.

I sent "Help, I'm trapped on a small blue planet!" It was one of the pre-written messages, but it seemed very appropriate at the time.

Kreme Meme, Part Three

There's a Krispy Kreme in the World Trade Center. I did not buy more doughnuts. I bought a T-shirt.

Roebling's Pride

My next stop was in Brooklyn - the far end of the Brooklyn Bridge, which I was going to walk across.

I have adored the Brooklyn Bridge for years, having never seen it before this, and I am pleased to report that Roebling's masterwork is holding up quite well, thanks.

In a normal suspension bridge, the entire roadway is a single structure. There are two sets of cables, one on either side of the roadway, holding the roadway up.

The Brooklyn Bridge might as well be two bridges. It has four sets of cables. The eastbound lanes are one structure, the westbound lanes another, each with its own set of cables. Except at the supports, there is no connection between the two. Nothing but air. And the pedestrian walkway.

Yes, the pedestrian way is made of slat boards which are placed across the tops of the two roadways, bridging that gap between the two. I did not know this in advance. This means that you can look down between the slats and there is nothing below you but the East River. A little disconcerting perhaps, but the walk is so beautiful, especially as you approach the city, that you don't care.

Saluda a Communidad Dominicana

I walked around for a while after that, gradually working my way back uptown. At one point I was trying to cross 6th Ave. but could not, because there was some sort of parade that was planning to happen, and even if the police hadn't blocked the streets, the crowd was so thick that I couldn't have made it through. People were dancing around in packs and creating a commotion, blowing whistles and beating drums and chanting, and everyone was wearing what were obviously the colors of a flag that I didn't recognize.

I cleverly got under 6th by going down into the subway and exiting on the other side. My mama raised no stupid children.

Later, after I had lunch, I decided to kill my remaining two hours with a quick visit to the Museum of Modern Art, but to get to it I had to cross 6th again, and by then the parade had actually started, so I gave up. I did manage to see what the parade was about, though. It was by and for the Dominican community in NYC - or at least the floats all had the title above.

Molly has another take on this same parade, by the by.

Celis and Fried Pickles

It's important here to realize that I'd checked out of my hotel when I left it that morning, because I didn't want to bother with having to come back and claim my bag later. I only had the one shoulder bag anyway, and it wasn't heavy (although it did start getting to me by the end of the day). Unfortunately this meant I didn't really have a good place to rest. At this point I'd walked around all morning, had acquired another bag with the Japanese pastries, and I badly needed to both eat and rest.

I had already noticed that there were a lot of restaurants in Times Square that apparently hadn't existed last time I was there - nor did my 1999 Zagat's have them - poor Zagat's, once a year is not fast enough to keep up with Manhattan restaurants. So I decided to try one of them. It was called Texas Texas.

The first thing they did right was that they had Celis beer. This is hard to get outside of the Gulf Coast. Celis White, their main product, is a white beer - it's cloudy and sort of citrusy and not a beer I'd drink with food, much less barbecue, even though I adore it. However, they also had Celis bock, which I didn't even know existed! So, one point for Texas Texas.

The second thing they did right was that they offered fried pickles as an appetizer. Now, I admit these are not for everyone. What you do is take dill pickle slices, drain them well, batter them, and fry them. You can't eat many at a time, I assure you, but they're really good. Actually, the restaurant had even managed to improve on the fried pickle, by serving them with a mild horseradish sauce. Two points total.

And that is all I can say which is pleasant about Texas Texas, other than that the service was quite good. Any brisket which I have difficulty cutting with a fork does not, excuse the pun, make the cut. The onion strings tasted exactly like Durkee canned french-fried onions, which was okay with me but would probably be an unpleasant surprise to most. I don't eat ribs, which are apparently their specialty, but if they have good ribs after having such bad brisket, I would be greatly surprised.

Craving Quiet

By this time, I had maybe two hours before my train, my feet were sore, my shoulders were sore, and I was wandering around looking for a coffeehouse. Suddenly I stopped and considered. Why a coffeehouse? It dawned on me then that what I was looking for was quiet. I wanted a calm place where nothing was happening around me. I had overdosed on New York.

So I went into Penn Station, bought a coffee and a bottled water, sat in a quiet corner of the waiting area, put my feet up, and read An Instance of the Fingerpost until time for the train.

It was unexpectedly pleasant.

Port Out Starboard Home

Hmm, I thought. I sat on the left side of the train coming in. I'd like the other view, so I'll sit on the right side of the train going home.

I was not showing off any analytical skill at the time, was I? A moment's thought should tell you how I goofed.

It didn't matter anyway. I was so exhausted I actually dozed off on the train once or twice. At New Haven, I figured I'd better remove my contact lenses, just in case I fell asleep again. When I sleep with them in, even for short times, they get nasty and irritated.

Of course, once I'd put my glasses on, I never dozed off again.