im still here

Hey Peeps.


Still alive. Just been busy. Busy being living it up in Beijing.


Well, not exactly. I have a lot of crap to say, more than a single blogpost should have, so I'll probably be doing a number of posts in the next few days rather than bore everyone with endless drivel. What was supposed to be a whole semester of trouble free play learning got a little complicated. Reason number one after the jump.  

In Piri I Trust

The above picture of Piri Weepu has been circling Facebook for the past two days. It pretty much sums up the first half of the All Blacks vs. Argentina quarterfinal that was played on Sunday. Piri was essentially a one man team with his accurate kicking, single-handedly (or single-footedly?) keeping us on the scoreboard for most of the game. He's a HALFBACK, to boot. See what I did there? For the uniformed, the 2011 Rugby World Cup is currently being held in New Zealand, my home country. Rugby is a contact sport played with an oval shaped ball and is considered a national religion of sorts. Kind of like what Star Craft 2 is to South Korea, but more extreme. In fact, it is so important to our country that whether we win or not will affect the next government election, the level of domestic violence (no jokes, as the 2007 World Cup exit revealed), whether our economy is totally fucked or just a little fucked, etc, etc. We are a small country, but we are very passionate about this sport, but evident by the strength of our national team, the All Blacks. Unfortunately, despite traditionally being the best team in the world year in and year out, it doesn't translate into World Cup championships. In fact, the last time we won the cup was back in 1987, during the inaugural competition.

The Argentinians certainly played a physical game, but there's no denying our boys in Black were pretty average in comparison to their usual high standards. The final scoreline of 33-10 is not wholly representative of how close the game was. It took us approximately three quarters of the game to cross the tryline for the first of our two tries (a try is the equivalent of a touchdown), having relied on Piri's penalty kicking prior to that. The Australians, whom won their respective game against South Africa, will be a different type of ballgame, but we will have to step up a notch, nevertheless. 

In other results; As I mentioned, Australia won against a tough South African side. Some say that the South Africans deserved the win, but the number of tackles Australia made to stop their opposition was amazing. They will no doubt be sore during the course of the week in the buildup to the semifinal with the All Blacks. Wales beat a a favoured Irish team and France pulled some more playoff magic against the English. The fans whom we watched the France England game with at The Den in Sunlitun were a passionate bunch. Plenty of friendly jabbing, chanting and singing. I decided to support the French, as I tend to like the underdog. "Allez les bleus! Allez les bleus!" Good times.

Lao Wais, a bar in Wudaokao, down the road from BLCU blatantly advertised on a blackboard outside the bar that all RWC games will be shown live. Since it's in Wudaokao, we thought it would be better than making several trips to Sunlitun, especially for less important games. Turns out you can't trust American bar owners who know shit about rugby and only wanted to attract more patrons...they couldn't even find the fucking channel. Ended up missing the whole Wales Ireland game. I would say that I will never go back there again, but our friend has a birthday party there this weekend.   

This blog post is my achievement for the day. Coughed all night and feel like shit, so i skipped my classes for the day.... Going to a different section of the Great Wall tomorrow with my fellow tongxue, so hopefully I feel a bit better.... damn you Yanjing beer.

i swear i saw a UFO on the Great Wall..

Hey peeps

Sorry about the delay. Been pretty busy doing various things. When I do get some free time, it's usually filled in by lengthy Star Craft 2 sessions. Need to get out of Bronze League one day. I've had this game for over a year now and I still can't crack into Silver, let alone Gold, Platinum, Diamond or Masters. I'd say Grandmasters is a little out of my reach. I'm a fairly realistic person. 

But yes, BLCU has been quite eventful during the past couple of weeks. I am definitely enjoying my time here so far. No classes in the afternoon, meeting people from around the world, seeing interesting places, playing pickup basketball whenever I want. Bloody brilliant.

Steve and I have been very good lately in regards to the toilet. No blockages recently. Edit: Scrap that. He has literally just informed me that the toilet is blocked again. It's probably a bit too late to knock on our neighbour's door to borrow their plunger....I swear we've used that thing at least 5 times... (Update: I'm forbidden from checking out the damage. I suppose I'll just have to hold it in until the morning..). Also, despite a few bites here and there, our mosquito problem seems to be easing up. Bombing the place with Raid tends to have that effect. Since I've been here, I've been bitten no less than thirteen times, with a good half being on my face >.<. Apparently they come up the drains at night, which makes me wonder what kind of nice diseases they potentially carry. I'm usually one of those nice people who prefers to gently pick up insects and toss them out the window so they can live out their minuscule lives, but mosquitoes aren't exactly a beautiful sight to behold..

Finally paid my accommodation fee a few days ago. They have a really shit payment system here. Half the time they don't know where the documents are. I swear the dude who took my money quoted a different price than the one written on my invoice, hoping I wouldn't read the invoice because he only returned the difference when i questioned him about the discrepancy. You really can't trust some people here. Steve had even more trouble. Despite our deposits having been done through the same agency at the same time, the people over here just couldn't locate his receipt. Took him an extra 2 to 3 weeks to GIVE THEM money because apparently they don't have a record of us making a deposit. What a load of shit.

Speaking of not trusting people, what would you do if you got your bike stolen outside your dormitory? Report it to the staff? Report it to the local security/police? In all honesty, you would probably accomplish jack shit and would probably have to buy a new bike. But wait, why buy a new bike when you can just take one? I mean, there's sooooo many. Surely no one would miss just one little shitty bike? In fact, how about I leave this "borrowed" bike somewhere random after I've finished with it at a location where the original owner will never find it and just take someone else's bike the next time i need to go somewhere? They're pieces of crap anyway! >_<. Sounds pretty absurd, right? Well our friend decided to do just that. Yes, the bike is a piece of shit, but I don't think that our friend grasps the concept that some less fortunate people may be dependenton this piece of shit and buying one is a lot harder for them than for more fortunate people like us. We were under the assumption that the bikes had been returned, so we initially thought it was a tad bit funny, until we walked past the place and realised that the bike was still sitting there. We would return it, but getting caught red handed with a stolen bike doesn't really appeal to me.  

Currently teaching a six year old kid how to speak English. His name's Michael. Cool little dude. He understands most of what I say, but getting him to reply back to me with more than one word responses is a bit difficult. I thought I was very clever by downloading some interactive Dr Seuss books onto my phone for him to read. Unfortunately, he seemed more interested in playing poker on his father's IPhone and listening to Chinese audio stories about cute little deer... I know he's a kid, but a cat in a hat smashes a Chinese Bambi clone any day.

Nice view from the Wall.

We're currently on the tail end of the "Golden Week" holidays. Although we haven't exactly made the most of it by going on a week-long trip to some exotic or isolated region of China (or Mongolia, as some of my fellow students have done), we did embark on a two day tramp/camping trip to an isolated area of the Great Wall. The specific area that we went to is called 箭扣(Jiankou). According to Wiki "This section is a photographic hotspot due to its unique style, steep mountains and beautiful scenery". From my two days of climbing and hiking, I would say that this is a very good description, but only being there can one fully appreciate how freaking cool the place is. Being able to see stars at night after a month of smog and bright lights is orgasmic in itself. Wiki also describes "This section of the Great Wall of China has fallen into disrepair and this, along with its location along a mountain ridge bordered by jagged cliffs and steep drop-offs, makes the Jiankou segment of the Great Wall of China potentially dangerous to climb". Lets just say I was wetting my pants at times. Not quite literally, but I probably came close, but man, what a thrill it was. I'd like to think that the gym membership investment helped with all the climbing, because some sections were downright difficult.  .

Apparently hiking in the Jiankou area is illegal. Good for us, because that means we can have the Wall to ourselves :). In reality, there were a few crazy locals who looked like they were going for a Sunday morning stroll in the local park. There was even a whole extended family group up there at one point. Maybe it's just me, but my idea of a family outing does not include premature death or debilitating injury after a slight misstep or after grabbing onto a supposedly stable rock. As for staying the night on the wall, not many were as crazy as us though, with the acception of a few other foreigners, evident by their annoying screams and calls into the valley in search of an elusive echo.

We hiked that (plus more). Just sayin'.

After determining that bunking up inside the watchtower would probably be unadviseable due to falling debris and spiders (not that we could sleep in there anyway, considering we smoked the place out with our fire..), we decided to sleep under the stars. Man...that was awesome. In the span of about ten minutes, I saw more shooting stars and satellites then I have in my whole life altogether. We also spotted a strange object that was brighter than anything else and seemed to move in different directions in a jerky movement every so often. Kind of freaked me out. I'd place a pretty big wager that it was more than just a star. One of our friends, Nick, had recently bought a laser pointer and someone suggested that he point it at the object. I couldn't help but think that we'd also get a laser shot at us, except that this laser would make a "PEOW!" noise and incinerate us to dust. 

Our home.

Our amazing fire.

Sometime during the night, we started hearing a lot of shouting. Nick thought it would be a good idea to shine his laser at the nearby mountain. As soon as he did so, several flashlights beamed on the same area. At first, we thought it was just some trampers messing around. However, as the night went on, we started to suspect something more serious. They knew where we were, so we couldn't just keep quiet and hope for the best. If this large group of men were police, we could possibly bribe them and avoid getting arrested. However, what the fuck do we do if they were thieves or hooligans? If you bribe them, they'd happily take that and everything else you have. Maybe worse. We decided to stay quiet and hope that they would walk in a different direction, but the voices were getting louder and they were without a doubt heading our way. We may have pissed our pants climbing things, but we were shitting our pants now. This was a whole new level. Do we run? What weapons besides our shoes did we have? The thought of sacrificing Steve assuming that they could be cannibals did cross my mind (albeit not much meat on him). "We fooooooooouuunnnd yooooooooooooooooooouuu!" shouted someone inside the now dimly-lit watchtower. If my heart ever skipped a beat, it probably would have been at that instance. Damn shitty reception on the Great Wall! Can't even tell anyone that I'm going to get violated by dirty Chinamen......As the men came upon us, Nick manages a "ah..Ni Hao...?" We adjusted to the bright flashlights and made out several men clad in either camo green or orange uniforms. These guys didn't look like thieves or paedophiles. In fact, they looked pretty cool and friendly. Some even spoke English. They explained that they were on their way to the other side of the mountain to rescue a girl who had injured herself. They didn't even care that we were sleeping on the wall. We had a friendly exchange with these men and they proceeded to climb on in the dark. They made easy work of any obstacle. Holy moly they were machines. One humourously shouted back "I LOVE YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUU, WE ARE CHINESE FIREMEN!!!". I couldn't help but profess my love back, because these guys were just so awesome. In the end, we didn't get robbed, arrested, killed or molested, but instead, we got to witness real heroes going about their duties. Now that shit is cool. Pity we didn't get a photo, but at that point, we were jsut happy to be alive.

The morning after. My hood looks like a headscarf/turbin

The rest of the night went fairly smoothly. I was sleeping on a slant though, so I woke up no less than ten times to readjust myself, and I'm pretty sure I kicked Nick in the head. There were some f-ed up noises coming from the bush around dawn. Those were some strange sounding beasts....I was pretty freaked out about the bats, but these new animals sounded like something from a horror movie. However, despite all the scary shit that happened, I wouldn't change it in anyway. The whole experience was amazing, and although it's technically illegal, I'd recommend hiking around this area to anyone, assuming you can walk and climb in difficult terrain. My last visit to the Great Wall was in a much more commercialised and developed area which just didn't have the same spirit to it. I've done alot of travelling in China, especailly during my last visit, and I can honestly say this is one of the best things I've done.

One more plank for the road.

DJ 

RIP Steve Jobs 

ny continued

 

The skyline has undoubtedly changed since then, and there were no tourists gawking from the base of the statue,but immigrants of yesteryear would have seen a very similar sight when they first reached the shores of their new home. That is, if you weren't part of the two or so percent that were turned back. Gutted much?

If at first you don't succeed, try, try and try again.

Easier said than done when you have traveled hundreds or thousands of kilometers by sea. 

The little cruise around the Statue of Liberty and our subsequent visit to Ellis Island was quite interesting, to say the least. It really gave us a good insight into why people made such long journeys for this opportunity, as well as the difficult process that was involved. After all, Ellis Island was the main gateway into the country for millions of people. Not wanting to miss the ferry back to Manhattan, our visit was fairly brief as a result, but we managed to take in all the important parts (I think). I'm sure the movie "Island of Hope-Island of Tears" that we attended would have been a great watch, but half an hour of napping in a dark room was more appealing to me. I'm sure it's available on Youtube anyway.    

The hall at Ellis Island where
immigrants were processed.

Having accomplished another "must-do" New York attraction(s), we made our way back to Manhattan. Do you like BBQ meats? Unless you're vegetarian (Respect. I can't do that shit), or rely on photosynthesis, I assume that you do. Well, my mate Jono suggested this place called Hill Country on his list of must dine places. He highly rated their ribs. In fact, he claimed they were the best ribs he has ever eaten. Bold claim. 

Turns out Monday was all you can eat night. $25US each person.How it works is that each "batch" consists of 4 types of meat (ribs, roast pork, roast chicken, whatever else it was), 2 sides, etc, and when you finish one batch, you request another one. I set a goal of at least six rounds of meat and sides (I was starving). Only managed two and a half measly portions. Regardless of how obese everyone else was in the restaurant, I still don't get how one person can stuff themselves in a single sitting the equivalent amount of food that could feed a whole Ethiopian village for months. I think we were close to throwing up at one point. The constant laughter over our weakness didn't help our cause. The collage of photos below is a rough photographic timeline of my progress over the evening.    

Slow death

Despite nearly splitting my stomach, I'm sure this was one of the most fun meals I've had in New York. My girlfriend wasn't stupid enough to gorge herself to the brink of death, but I was willing to self-mutilate my body to provide us with a few laughs. Next time I'll consider sticking a finger down my throat after each plate.

 

D 

i'm alive yay

Hey guys. I haven't ditched this blog. Just been occupied. And jet lagged. In Vancouver right now, which means that I survived dirty old Irene. What a bitch she was, causing all that trouble. In all honesty, Irene didn't really affect us, thank Bob, but all the news coverage definitely got us worried about whether we would be able to fly on Saturday morning. Airlines were cancelling several of their scheduled flights on the east coast. In some cases, all were canned. Although New York is quite far up north, Irene was expected to pay us a visit in a big way. Even public transport was ordered to stop by the afternoon to prevent any damage. We were very fortunate because our 11.30am flight to Minnesota scraped in before all the flights were grounded. Sad, though, to hear about the damage and loss of life it has caused in other states,as well as neighboring countries. The cost of this event will be ranked in the top 10 costliest disasters in US history according to reports. Because most of the damage was caused by flooding and the wind itself, much of it may not be covered by insurance as flood damage is not listed in many policies. It seems so surreal (if that's an appropriate word for this situation) that we were only there a few days ago, when everything seemed fine and all of a sudden, things became chaotic. Although NY ended up avoiding the full brunt of Irene, extensive damage was done, nevertheless.  Oh well, lucky us.

Unassuming little place on a quiet little
street in Chinatown.......

....but the dumplings were pretty fucking tasty.

Some catching up to do....where do I start.....did I mention that food is awesome in New York? As I've said before, food in NY is not all about hotdogs and pizza. Not to say that I haven't eaten copious amounts of the aforementioned food items during my time here, but I most definitely had enough space in my GI tract for other yummies.

When looking at places where good food is available, you can't go wrong with Chinatown. The place has a more distinct scent separate from the other parts of Manhattan. It's like HK, with its occasional whiff of sewerage (still much better than China...that place smells like you're riding Splash Mountain, except the log you're riding is a different type of log, and the water is yellow). Ah...those Chinese and their funny smelling ways,... We first went to this place called Prosperity Dumpling, where they made, er, dumplings.We could have ordered other stuff other than dumplings, but that would be likened to the idiot who orders steak at a seafood restaurant.It was something stupid like 5 dumplings for a dollar. My grandma makes some pretty phat gaozhis (and she doesn't charge me) but these were pretty awesome too. The place is a hole in a wall, seats four people max, but the atmosphere is not the reason it's famous.           

Essentials

I wonder what the Chinese
translate to. I don't think
it's Golden Unicorn.

Afterwards, we got some dim sum at Golden Unicorn. LMAO. Didn't know unicorns figured into Chinese mythology. If I'm not mistaken, that thing on the left is not even a unicorn. That thing has wings, fool! Mythological animal identity crisis aside, the dim sum was choice. Was pretty full by the end of it, evident by the fact that I walked into the kitchen, thinking it was the exit.    


Scroll down for other yummies.
 

Lost your appetite? Was pleasantly surprised that the NY subway wasn't as bad as its reputation made it out to be...until we nearly stepped on this(I'm sure one of us stepped on that trail of questionable liquid though...please be Gatorade). Prior beliefs dashed in an instant. OK truth be told, I knew the subway is pretty filthy at times. That's to be expected in a big city with a old system like this one, but couldn't the guy have just stepped into Mcdonalds or some other public toilet? Did he REALLY need to lay a cable right there and then that badly? Actually, that pile doesn't look like a cable at all....it's just a saying I learned during my tenure in good old, classy Invercargill. 

After our brief visit to Chinatown, we made our way to the Financial Center. We've already been to this area, as detailed by a previous post, but we didn't have the opportunity to explore it more thoroughly. To be honest, there wasn't too much. Architecture is impressive, but most of the action is inside, where we can't go in, especially on Wall Street.   

I don't even remember what this building
was. Could someone enlighten me?

The statue of the bull is a representation of a market where a trend of
high.......OK yeah it's a picture of me licking its, er, udders.

 
To be continued tomorrow.

D

Pizza is yum

*sorry peeps. been too occupied and exhausted over the past few days to update. hopefully i recall most of the good stuff* 

People who wait in a block-long line outside a Abercrombie and Fitch store (as I observed on 5th Avenue)for must be going inside to gawk at the shirtless male models or even to get high on the excessive perfume sprayed around the store, because those threads are just not worth waiting an hour plus over. Then again, some people really do want to look like preppy jerk-offs...

The people in front comprised of about 25% of the whole line
waiting for the place to open.

The doorman is really good at making people disappearing....
.....into Grimaldis! HAHAHA. G

However, some establishments really do deserve this sort of ludacris dedication. This includes Grimaldis Pizzeria, a little, understated joint located under the Brooklyn Bridge on the Brooklyn side of the East River. It is not only decent, but it's known to be one of the best, if not THE best pizzeria in New York. What is different about Grimaldis pizzas? I don't know, but they are cooked using traditional coal brick ovens, which are apparently illegal in the Manhattan area (stems from old legislation, no clear reasoning). Considering that we started waiting in the sizable line half an hour BEFORE the restaurant even opened, my expectations were justifiably high. As soon as the clock hit twelve o'clock, we were finally beckoned in by the doorman (who looked like he had just finished making cement shoes at the local lake). The place was filled to the brim, and the line outside continued to extend down the footpath. The menu was pretty straight forward. Large or medium? Tomato or white-based  pizza? Toppings? Extras? Sorry for anyone with a stapled stomach, but there is a no single slice policy, so we had to order and attempt to finish a whole pizza. It was brilliant and lives up to its billing. Apparently this place has been served with eviction papers recently, and will have to move, despite having the place consistently full. If that is true, then we sure are lucky to have had the chance to visit Grimaldis in the original location. The service and atmosphere were simple, and the all-male staff weren't the easiest on the eye, but in the end, it's all about pizza. A pizza which happens to be the best I've ever had. 

You finished taking photos yet?

Having eaten our pizza and looking three months pregnant as a result, we decided to hire some bikes and ride over the Brooklyn bridge. Despite being right next to the shoreline, we still had to backtrack and make our way through Brooklyn Heights because the bridge extends quite far inland. All I wanted to was change up my

gears and hoon my way across the bridge at breakneck speeds. However, leaving my girlfriend in my dust would have had dire consequences, therefore I was forced to bring it down a notch. Comparing this to our bike ride over the Golden Gate Bridge (which is more of a....hmmm.... red?), I wouldn't say it gave me the same feeling of awe, but it definitely was a good experience, regardless.

View of Manhattan from the bridge.

We eventually made our way to Ground Zero, something very high on my list of things to do in NY. It's 's obviously serious subject matter, so I will treat it as such. For those not faimliar with the 'Ground Zero' term, it's the area where the Twin Towers used to stand before the events of 9/11. The enormous impact to the financial center infrastructure, and of course, from an emotional perspective, is still very evident. Construction of the memorial, as well as 1 WTC (formerly known as the "Freedom Tower"), will be completed this September and January 2013, respectively. The memorial is named Reflecting Absence and has a associated preview site half a block away. This preview site is essentially a museum of sorts dedicated to 9/11. All net income from the store goes towards construction/maintenance of the memorial, as well as associated organisations such as the FDNY and NYPD funds, etc.

A model of the Statue of Liberty covered in  badges and photos of servicemen,  messages, etc.

Having occured on the other side of the world and at a time when I was much younger, it was hard to fully comprehend the scale of this tragedy, resulting in a sense of detachment. However,while pensively looking up at the suddenly rainy area of sky where the towers would have otherwise have covered, a sense of melancholy overcame me. My sadness towards this does not compare to those who have been more directly affected, but this experience has definitely increased my understanding about its impact.

Ground Zero (sort of.. virtually impossible to get a photo of any significance)
and the half-constructed "Freedom Tower". A couple of nearby buildings also are in the process of rebulding.

Grim ending to today's post, I know, but it was and eye-opening experience that I wanted to write about and share to those interested enough to read. Less depressing stuff next post, I promise.

D

A little update

Manhattan skyline from Brooklyn.

Just thought I'd kill some time while the girlfriend does some retail therapy. My primary job is to look up from time to time and give the yes or no about a certain piece of clothing/shoe. Most of the time she disagrees with my opinion regarding fashion anyway, so I'm not to sure why she even asks...

I'm not one to self-inflict major financial damage via retail. In fact, I'm actually shocked by the level of consumerism in this city that seems to take hold of normal people and turn them into soulless demons. Demons whom are willing to claw each others' eyes out just to get that last size twelve, purple cashmere cardigan. Lets face it, sales in NZ and sales in the USA are from different dimensions. This leads me to wonder how many people get trodden to death during the Christmas shopping season.. However, I do tend to forget about my apparent disdain towards excessive material consumption when it comes to basketball apparel (Nike and Jordan being the main culprits). I've promised myself to be sensible, but at the same time it's almost a shame if I were not to take advantage of the favorable exchange rate.......hey, at least I'm not into high-end fashion where the packaging alone costs the equivalent of feeding the whole developing world.

In the end, I know my main purpose here was wasn't to shop. The day was balanced with a nice visit over the East River (which isn't really a river at all) where we spent a couple of hours at a Brooklyn food market. I like my bacon butties from the Dunedin farmers' market, but the selection at this place was incredible. Everything from homebrewed beer, asian style hotdogs, to tacos was on offer. This is the kind of thing a 'real' New Yorker would enjoy. Truly in a NY state of mind...assuming stuffing yourself silly with delicious morsels of food qualifies.

Hotdog with spring onions and charsiu...identity crisis, much?

Where's that Footlocker..?

A quick ride back over the East River landed us on 34th street. A little stroll down this road lead us to a little building called the Empire State Building. Not bad. I highly recommend anyone thinking of visiting this place to hire the optional audio tour guide. The experience is made that much better when an old Jewish(he sounds like Woody Allen, although he might be Italian..) NY'er describes the greatness of this building, and the greatness of NY city in general. Nothing much needs to be said about this iconic landmark, but below are a couple of photos to give you an idea about how awesome the visit was.

Random facts: In those days, there weren't many safety regulations so they were essentially constructing this building at a rate of one floor a day(!). Based on past occurences, they were expecting one worker to die for each floor, therefore approximately 100 people should have died. In fact, only FIVE people died during the construction(officially), with only two falling off and one guy getting his head knocked off when he looked up the elevator shaft (you get the idea).

Various views of and from the Empire State Building.

The floor area surrounding me is cluttered with shoes. It really does look a warzone. I've been sitting at this chair typing this blog on my phone for a while now. The people that walk by changes constantly, but they all have the same goal: get as much shit as their credit allows. The girlfriend still isn't back (we're in the shoe section of Macy's, the biggest department store in the world. 'Nuff said), so I'll have a quick nap amidst all this chaos...

D

These buskers in the subway were good. Especially the singer. The guy with the keyboard was singing, not the flute player. Singing while playing the flute at the same time would be crazy shit.

So this is where David Letterman is taped!

Flying domestic in the US is a pretty grim process. Firstly, the 'standard fee' they slapped on for checking in luggage wasn't very pleasant. I know that not everyone checks in luggage, but it seems downright greedy considering the substantial price of the ticket alone. Then, we have customs. Admittedly, all the extra security and eyes make me nervous about small things. "Shit, where are those coins!! I can still hear clinking!!" Being frisked isn't on my list of things to do while on this trip. Also, the whole thing about allocating seats at the boarding gate because a flight is overbooked just doesn't make much sense to me. Why should I be allocated a seat last and grouped with the standby lot when I booked my ticket months prior? In the end I finally got my seat, but the same can't be said about the intoxicated cracker lady who got lead off the plane for a "talk". Lucky day for someone who purchased a standby ticket.

The air hostesses (stewardess?) were friendly, though.  

A few hours consisting of broken sleep and getting my eyes gouged out by a monstrosity of a movie called Arthur later, we arrive in Atlanta for a stopover. Nothing exciting. It was 6am eastern time, after all. The drinks vending machine made purchasing a Powerade entertaining with its robotic suction/ejecting mechanism, though. Two and a half hours later, we hop on to another plane and before I knew it, we landed in New York. 

"Wow, look at that!" Seeing the Manhattan skyline of the city was pretty impressive ("Yeah that's awesome"). That was until I realised that it wasn't Manhattan at all and I was looking in the wrong direction (probably New Jersey). I kept quiet to spare me the loss of dignity. 

To say this city is busy is an understatement. It's like saying Sanjay, my Aborigine friend, is brown (he's more of a 'burnt to a crisp' tone). Despite all the excitement, all I wanted to do was have a quick nap before doing anything. Turns out the place we are staying at is on the 4th floor and has no lift. I'm not a complete leaf, but carrying full, overweight suitcases up flights of stairs is a bitch no matter how you look at it.  

Ended up skipping the nap and decided to walk a few blocks to Times Square. Yes, blocks. We managed to find a really decent sublet right in the middle of the city on Craigslist for a very fair price. For people who are thinking of hitting New York, or any foreign place for that matter and want to stay at accommodation other than hotels/hostels etc., be careful about who you deal with on Craigslist. LOL the first listing i clicked and dealt with turned out to be a scam from Nigeria "PLEASE SEND THE MONEY ASAP" *lol*. Luckily no money was exchanged. As long as they only ask for a couple of nights deposit and do it through Paypal, it usually means it's genuine.

"Hey hombre, could you spare some change? It's really hot in here."

As for my visit to Times Square..it was what I expeted it to be; ridiculously commercialised, and BUSY. It was daytime when we first went but when we returned later that night, we couldn't tell the difference at times because the lights and billboards were so intensely bright. I really do wonder how much P.Diddy paid to have himself look so BOSS on that massive billboard on the side of the building. He can't rap to save his life and his producing is questionable, but he sure knows how to make coin and "mindfuck"*LOL*.
 
Half the day had already passed by the time we arrived, so we decided to settle for a Broadway show. Settle probably isn't the best word, because these shows are, from what I heard, pretty amazing. Since we were seeking tickets for a show for the same evening, we could get discounted tickets from Ticket(ing?) Kiosk Times Square (TKTS) which is essentially a ticket booth selling heavily discounted tickets for most shows showing that day. As you can guess, the line was pretty nuts. An hour and a half wait to get our tickets to Cirque du Soleil: Zarkana (it was tempting to give in to the scalpers, even though they probably would have ripped us off).

140 down to 70 each. Probably worth the hot, long wait....

Before the show started, we decided to get a slice of pizza for dinner. As we were making our way to sit down and wait for our food to get prepared, we were told we were only allowed to sit on the stools in the corner, away from the main dining area. I'm sure I had my "WTF, bitch" face on for a second and I had temptations of busting out the race card, but it turns out they have some rule about no pizza being consumed on the tables. They were reserved for pasta consumption. Note to self: people who eat pizza are considered savages in New York.             

If you read my last post, you'll probably remember me mention that I got "hustled" by some black dudes. Well, as I said, I bought a Cal. Golden Bears shirt from Berkeley and decided to wear it. One of the guys gets drawn to it (probably from Cali) and introduces himself as Timboking and proceeds to give me his mixtape. Before I get to say much, he has already signed it and asks for a donation. Ok, fine, no biggy, he seems like a cool enough guy. However, more guys come over and try to get a piece of the action. They all seemed OK and weren't asking for much, except this one particular guy who asked for 20 bux. I didn't have any small notes on me at that particular time and I wasn't really curious about what would happen if i declined, considering I was surrounded by several buff and black G's. The guy gave me change alright. A change in the amount I was meant to get back. Lets just say it wasn't what I was expecting back. Lesson learned. I did a quick search of Timboking and apparently he's an associate of the Wutang Clan. If that's legit, then that's pretty cool. I feel less fob.    

Probably infringing on copyrights so I better make it clear that
I DO NOT OWN THIS PHOTO

The first of a several Broadway shows that we plan to see turned out to be pretty awesome. It's a blend of singing, dancing, circus tricks, etc. reinvented with a fantasy theme and design. In a nutshell, it's a story about a wizard who loses his romantic interest, loses his magic as a result and then gets stuck in a pretty messed up realm full of f-ed up entities. To be honest, I didn't know what the hell they were going on about, but it sure was orgasmic for the eyes. Highlights included the tightrope walkers on the highwire. They didn't just walk along the wire(rope?). They ran, they danced, did flips and stood on each other among other things while maitaning balance. Another mention is the wheel of death act where two acrobats did various maneuvers on this continuously rotating contraception. It is pretty hard to describe so google it and you'll see what i mean. The clowns were entertaining between acts, albeit a tiny bit cheesy. One scene involved a clown being held high over the audience to depict him travelling through time and space (or something) and he proceeds to flash the Boston Red Sox logo, to the chagrin of the crowd. He redeemed himself by correcting it to the New York Yankees logo which resulted in a loud cheer from everyone.

Not everyday that you see clowns fly. Or get hustled by big black people...

D