New York Dec 4-8

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New York!!

Alas, perhaps we should have listened to advice that we may need some quiet time after the manic pre-departure we had. Nonetheless Annette had images of NYC in the summer and failed to integrate that not only would it be cold, it would be freeeezing.

We arrived on Dec 4 after a long haul flight of about 22 hours. Annette having slept most of the way (scraps of sleep, but the hours add up). Religiously chewing her homeopathic tabs 'jet ease' which were fab...Ariel being a bit tired. Arriving around 9pm we resiliently faced the NY night. It was then the cold sort of hit us. Was expecting 10 degrees but it was 0.

Made our way via subway. We were actually heading to New Jersey as were being hosted there by a SERVAS family. Alas by the time we made it to the train we'd just missed the final NJ train (12:30pm) and had to interpret our host´s email which said ´call anytime´. Took some time working out the phones and called. What a legend was Anne. She picked us up at 1am finally. Suddenly we were in leafy South Orange, New Jersey, sleeping in a small cellar like room downstairs in her family home.

Next days pulled out all the woolies and got going. Wanted to pack as much in as possible despite the fact that it was going to be an effort with jet lag, Annette getting a very sore throat, the freezing weather etc...but still this Aries is ambitious and we did loads.

We started at Times Square to give us the overview, so many people pounding the pavement. We got lost in many throngs. Pre Christmas shopping or is it always like that? Pleased to say we didn´t enter one clothes shop the whole time we were there! Made our way to Greenwich village for lunch at a small korean zen place and I started wondering - could manage the whole of NY indoors? We explored the jazz clubs in the West village, and decided to see a Hispanic Ballet that night in Chelsea. We had dinner at a fancy place called Orchard and arrived to see our show. Annette fell asleep almost immediately. Ariel says it was good!

The next day we went onto walk in Central Park, via Strawberry Fields to the MET museum where we spent a couple of hours roaming. We went separately. Annette checked out the Byzantine textiles and Islam exhibitions, and Ariel the Modern Art exhibition. We found eachother accidentally in Ancient Greece and together visted the Egypt collection. We then made our way to the Neue cafe just up the road for a Viennese afternoon tea before heading to Katz´s cafe in the Lower East side for a matza ball soup, yummmm!
We then attended a world music performance in the upper west side which included a vibraphonist. Annette fell asleep again. Ariel says it was ók´. We returned via the Lincoln Centre and Carnegie Hall (where we felt a bit regretful we hadn´t seen the Phillip Glass performance instead) before heading to the East Village for a snack. Another huge day!

Annette headed off early the next morn to check out a CERES like plot of green space in the East Village which is known for its dedicated community who fought so hard so hrd to protect it from development. Made me (annette) feel that we're doing very well at CERES. This place was very run down and full of weeds in comparison, despite it being a valuable piece of public space.

That afternoon we visited Harlem, altough apparently not the heart of Harlem (gotta get off at 120th street not 116th, next time we´ll get that right) but got a small feel. We then trained all the way to Brooklyn and walked thru downtown to Brooklyn Heights (great), along the boardwalk to see the amazing views of Manhatten. It started to snow again so we bravely crossed to Dumbo, the arts district under the Manhatten bridge before jumping on a train. We had a dinner to get to with our host family in NJ and thru an amazing coincidence of train timetables we got there on time. Our dinner was with 2 other families and we had a fabulous time. Annette met 2 people who had lived in Israel for 16 years and chatted lots about Israel, politics and their choice to leave. We also discussed George Bush, Hilary Clinton, the history of civil liberties and other things while eating a sumptious Hungarian broth which almost thawed our bones.

The next day we flew via Miami and Santiago to Punta Arenas in Southern Chile.

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