I landed in New York on Saturday night, the night of the second snowstorm of the winter. On Sunday I woke up to a Manhattan morning, looked out of my hotel window to a scene of New York yellow cabs in the snow.
".......yellow schools of taxi fishes........"
When I arrive in a town I like to walk some of it to get the layout. Then I feel comfortable. I arrived in New York looking over my shoulder every two minutes, looking for muggers in every doorway. Despite this, and 5 inches if snow, I still had to do it, so I set off up 8th Avenue to the South end of Central Park, past the Park-Lane affluent hotels with their liveried doormen. Then down 5th Avenue to Broadway and back over to 8th and the Olympic Diner for breakfast. By this time I was confident I wouldn't get mugged, so settled in to the diner for breakfast. I ordered scrambled eggs, toast, the inevitable hash browns, and coffee. All for $7. This place had the feel of the diners run by Greeks in Finsbury Park, London, the only thing that told you you were in New York were the 30s black and white photos of the city on the walls. Somehow New York looks good in black and white. Maybe this is because it was in its heyday in the twenties and thirties when black and white was the only choice. The proprietor was interested in my Psion, I told him a little about it and what I was writing. Like you might expect in the "Capital of Mammon", he seemed more interested in what it was worth that what it could do or what it contained. I lied about what it was worth; probably that New York paranoia again. Was someone listening on the next table and planning to mug me for it when I left? Would they assume that if I had a $500 pocket computer that I was worth turning over?
Fortified by the Olympic Diner Breakfast, I decided to have a real look round. No one mugged me as I left.
I walked much of mid town Manhattan that day, from the Flat iron Building in the south, I headed North. The morning was cold but the sun was shining out of an azure sky, not what I expected at all. I crossed Central Park from East to West, pausing to look at Wolman Rink.
".....There are 29 skaters on Wolman Rink circling in singles and in pairs"
Well there might have been when Joni walked by, but not today, just a few joggers and dog-walkers. On the West side I walked up as far as 96th Street.
While black and white gives it character, New York still looks as good in 3D colour. The snow lay deep in the ground, and armies of municipal workers were out in force clearing the sidewalks with large snow scrapers.
New York is the place if you're in to Art Deco. Some of the buildings are just stunning. Like the cathedral builders of old who built high to be closer to God, the Art Deco Architects built high not to be closer to God but because of the rocketing price of real estate. Art deco conjures up visions of evening parties by a moonlit ocean, attended by waif-like flappers in diamanté skull caps and frilly mini dresses. They dance the night away with bright young things in black tie and tail-coats. While the Empire State is the tallest and most famous of the Art Deco cathedrals, for me it is dwarfed for sheer style and beauty by the Chrysler Building. I'd seen it on countless opening sequences to American cop shows and films. Its chevroned top section illuminated with neon against the Manhattan skyline, as the camera helicopter sweeps past, you know the one. But to see it in daylight from the street, reflecting the morning sun took my breath away. The building is a typical Art Deco tower with the classic stepped construction. The lower section, unremarkable apart from the lions that guard the four corners and look down on passers by. The second rectangular section takes you soaring above the street, but the top section is he crowning glory. Gently curving and sensually tapered it’s covered with reflective chevrons that make it shine like a multi-faceted diamond in the morning sun, sweeping upwards to a single stiletto-spike. This top section seemed to be on fire, on that bright January morning, reflecting the full glory of the sun. To me its a "must see" in New York. Unfortunately the interior is closed to the public, but a quiet word with the security man, and he'll let you photograph the foyer from the entrance. Here's where the Cathedral analogy continues, the architects have given the interior the decor to match the outside. It has a foyer the size of a tennis court. The whole of the interior has an opulent golden-brown glow, a contrast to the clinical black and silver of the Empire State. The roof of the entrance hall has a remarkable frieze of the building painted on it. Looking overhead you get the impression of looking at a hazy sepia photograph.
It’s a short walk from Grand Central Station, another deco monument, where you can nibble on a myriad of different fast foods and sip Cappuccino under gigantic chandeliers.
During my walk round Manhattan, I revelled in the street and place names. Straight out of a New York mythology: Macy's, Broadway, Bloomingdales, 42nd St, Times Square. They were all there, but just below the gloss, just a few blocks West from Times Square were places you wouldn't walk around on your own at night. Where the crack dealers swagger, and the sad flotsam of life drift around. New York stays together because of its neighbourhood system. Each has its on distinct and individual community. Chinese, Italian, Hispanic. I found myself wondering what had happened to the great "melting pot" that was supposed to be the USA. Later in my trip I found out that the neighbourhoods do not mix or integrate too much. Ethnic groups stay together and guard their neighbourhoods jealously. Moving in and out of these neighbourhoods are dangerous men in fast cars and heavy gold jewellery. Men who'd
".......eat their young alive, for a Jaguar in the drive"
Always accompanied by mean men in Foster Grants, they suck this place dry; they leave a slime trail of dead souls behind them as they ply their deadly trade. Good people keep away. They keep away because of the hopelessness of it all. It’s better than it was, New York, better than before "Zero Tolerance", and you can walk around at night but you'd better pick your neighbourhood carefully. New York is still a city of the hopeful and the hopeless in equal proportions. Immigrants still flood here to make a living, driving Yellow cabs, while
"....business men in button downs press in to conference rooms"
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