New York Day 2

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Woke up early, around half seven, having collapsed the previous night into a significantly more comfortable hostel bed than I'd endured for the last two months. Showered and went down to wait to see what breakfast would be like. I wasn't to be disappointed - large bagels, muffins, apples and coffee meant I could stock up well for the mornings excursions.

I researched a few things online, and decided that I'd first head to the free Sony Technology Wonder Lab, which turned out to be largely closed for refurbishment - bar one floor containing several playstation 3's and massive (60”?) plasma screens. In spite of this, it had a staff of about fifteen manning the tiny floor.

Still, as this had taken a shorter time than expected, I decided to go in search of the statue of liberty - no easy feat given both the unclear metro signs, and the fact that there were several service changes put for the weekend. Eventually I got to battery park, the place ferries leave from, and realised I'd ended up in tourist central. At least seven men dressed up as the statue of liberty were on hand to have a picture taken with, swarms of african american gentlemen queued to sell me the latest (doubtless fully genuine) designer handbags. The queue to get on the ferry didn't look so bad, until I realised that there was a separate queue for tickets which cunningly wove in a circular fashion round a large building, so you could never be quite sure where you were. I decided to endure this to secure my ticket, but book for tomorrow to split my waiting up a little.

Across the road I noticed the promising sounding 'Museum of the American Indian - Open free to the public'. Excellent, I thought. Let's see some totem poles and tribal masks. As I passed through the airport style security, I wondered just how cool the exhibits would be if they warranted this much protection. Were there priceless head dresses made of exquisite feathers? Authentic bows and arrows? Tribal dresses? Well - not quite. When I cleared security I was confronted with two sections. One contained five pieces of modern american Indian art, and the other could have been the results of a Google image search for 'American Indians'. It was, in short, pathetic, but with one redeeming feature: the art section contained an old arcade machine which was turned on, and seemingly waiting for one to play the fighting game on offer.

I was clever enough to notice that this was meant to be a 'work of art' (cough), so it amused me a lot to sit back and see several americans get shouted at by the security guard for trying to play it.


In the afternoon, after a $2 pretzel lunch, I was a little unsure where to go. New York has a lot to do, but my laptop and leaflets were back at the hostel. Thus a quick prod of the subway map informed me I should head to Brooklyn Bridge for a stroll. The bridge itself is fairly impressive, and the view from it good. You can see a bit of the manhattan skyline - I may go back in the evening at some point - as helicopters hover in and out, the yellow water taxi chugs away underneath you, and a smug, whiny cyclist refuses drawls 'get out of the cycle lane' as soon as so much as a toe crosses into the sacred zone, you feel a sense of seeing a cross section of New York - from the city to the sea.

I then headed, by accident, to the American Museum of Natural History, which is conveniently accessible from the subway, and with my student card cost only $11 to enter. This had a lot more cool stuff than the mornings' museum. In particular, the American Indians exhibit was fascinating - especially their striking ritual masks.

The scariest moment came when, whilst browsing the 'African Peoples' exhibit, I glanced up into the gloom above me to be confronted with the life sized model shown in one of the photographs. The flash lights it up a lot, but be assured it was significantly darker in the flesh!

Then spent the evening 'chilling' in the hostel with a couple of beers (who am i to object if they are put before me) chatting to the usual diverse range of people found in these places.

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Photos

Watch your head
Possibly the scariest thing to put in a museum to date. Hidden in the gloom above the exhibits until an innocent tourist glances upwards...