NEW YORK

I'm not exactly sure what could be considered "cramming" more: trying to see New York in 4 days or trying to write about it in one page. The scenario was this; the year was 1999; my father (whom I hadn't seen in some time) was due to participate in his annual TESOL Conference - an event that brings together ESL teachers from all over the world. The year before ('98) had been in Seattle, the last one ('01) was held in Cyprus. TESOL 99 on the other hand was held in New York, rumored to be one of the most fascinating cities to possibly visit. I saw this as a case of opportunity rising. I would be able to crash on the floor at my father hotel and roam around the streets of Manhattan all day long while he attended the conferences. While obviously a little more time would have been handy, a chance to visit the United States most vibrant & expensive city free of lodging expenses was too good to walk away from.....

New York was originally called "New Amsterdam" back in the mid 1600's. Manhattan Island was found by an English explorer under Dutch sponsorship named Henry Hudson in 1609. It was promptly acquired from the Native Americans by a Dutch official named Peter Minuit for a box of trinkets containing an estimated worth of about 60 guilders ($24) in 1626!!! That won't even buy you less than one square inch of office space in New York now so as you can see it was quite a bargain. New Amsterdam stayed in Dutch control for some 40 years until it was inevitably seized by the British Empire, under King Charles II.

The American revolution in the late 1700's saw the city change hands a final time and New York was actually made the capital of the United States for a year in 1789 when George Washington was made president, before eventually being switched to Washington DC. Unlike my native San Francisco, it was not gold or silver that made New York City the Metropolitan Blitz it is today but actually an influx of publishers and writers. Until the 1850's, NYC was still behind Boston and Philadelphia in terms of intellect. In 1855, critically acclaimed NYC poet Walt Whitman released "Lovers of Grass" as artists, writers, editors, illustrators and musicians began to flood Manhattan in anticipation of a burgeoning artistic market the city looked to be about spawn. Amongst this exodus was a novelist named Theodore Dreiser, whose ancestry would go on to include photographer Alfred Stedglitz, painter Ben Shew, poet Delmore Schwartz, composer Duke Ellington, film maker Woody Allen exotic photographer Diane Arbas as well as Marin Scorsese - the director of Main Street, Taxi Driver and New York, New York! Soon Greenwich Village, Soho, 5th Ave, Times Square, along with many other parts of Manhattan became havens for artists and a thriving youth culture developed. Today New York claims to be the "Intellectual Capital" of the United States and quite rightfully so! The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, Time Magazine and many other universally read Medias. The towering skyscrapers, international monuments, plentiful world class museums, seemingly endless nightlife, vibrant parks and it's sheer vastness has made New York City a have to see for all world explorers.

Above: In appreciation to the United States, I decided to bring this little sculpture I had. Instead, it seems as if the French beat me to it.... and made it a little bigger.....

This all left me with the absolute impossible task of seeing New York in less than a week. Nevertheless, I gave it my best attempt; 5th Avenue, Times Square, The Empire State Building, World Trade Center, Statue of Liberty, Central Park, Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, Guggenheim Museum, Harlem, the Chrystler Building, Rockefeller center, etc...... it was all done! In between that, I managed to sandwich in some quality time with pops, including Comedy Clubs in the Soho and two Broadway Shows; The Scarlet Pimpernel & Miss Saigon! Left: The Empire State Building was actually the world's tallest building when it was created in 1931!

New York certainly is a blast. Like any great city, it is littered with historical sights, culture and nightlife everywhere you look. Just walking around, anywhere in the city are extraordinary views, subcultures, state of the art architecture and a seemingly bottomless pit of entertainment. It almost seemed surreal, being able to stand right in front of David Letterman's NBC Studio or the possibility of getting onto MTV simply by showing up at their doorstep. New York certainly is a place of opportunity, mystique and most of all.... culture - a seemingly unlimited supply of that! The only disappointment I can think of we had on the trip, apart from the hole in the pocket it caused, was, surprisingly - possibly New York's most treasured monument; The Statue Of Liberty. The Statue was a gift from French Politician & admirer of American Culture Rene Lefevre de Laboulage as a gift honoring American & French Brotherhood. It was sculpted in 1885 by Auguste Bartholdi with the help of Gustave Eiffel, best known for engineering the Eiffel Tower. First of all, the statue is nowhere near as big as it looks on television. Getting there.... a ferry from Manhattan to Liberty Island - only takes a good 20 minutes but there's plenty of waiting in lines to get on it. Getting to the top of the statue is a grueling, slow 3 hour haul in the statue's un-air conditioned and cramped staircase. Then there's the view itself, a disappointing and uninspired shot of Brooklyn's Bronx Harbor - not the picturesque Manhattan Skyline one might assume....... My advice is to those going to New York, see the Statue of Liberty but try and get there early and beat the crowd or else it's going to cost you the day and frankly, probably not even worth it.

Above: The vibrance of Times Square

It's hard to pick a highlight of the trip but Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, located of the east tip of Central Park, was possibly one of the most impressive museums I've ever been to - with quite possibly the exception of Paris's Le Louvre. The Liberty Tower and of course the mesmerizing World Trade Center Towers, tragically no longer there, are also incredible sights. In truth, it doesn't quite matter what you see and do in New York. The cities true beauty is its atmosphere, something that can be found on virtually every street corner. As the Insiders Guide to New York put it, "......it is a contrast or perhaps the coexistence between life ascendant and life descendant; chess next to pornography; a book and a beggar......" Left: a good example of a contrast between life ascendant and life descendant?"

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