Friday May 11th – And so, with Calvin and Hicham gone I was once again in the company of strangers at the hostel, so I allowed myself the luxury of sleeping in. I haven’t mentioned it in the last couple of entries, but rest assured that four of my five room-mates were still snoring their heads off all night long, and I had to keep track of my teenage-pig bunk mate’s food spillages to minimise the return of our mousey little friends. I still heard scampering once or twice, but I just tried to ignore it. So… yeah. I had a good, long sleep after my room-mates had departed for the day, and rushed downstairs just in time to grab my bagel before the canteen stopped serving breakfast.
After a peep out the window in the common room, I realised that I had just slept through one of the most beautiful mornings I’d seen since arriving in NYC, so I raced upstairs to shower and throw some clothes on before heading to the subway. I still wasn’t exactly clear on where I was going, but I knew I needed to be outside! It wasn’t til I was on the subway headed downtown that I decided to visit Central Park. It was sunny and it was beautiful, and I didn’t know how many more days like this I would be lucky enough to have! I whipped out my map and discovered there was an entry to the park on 72nd Street, and so that’s where I hopped off.
Emerging from underground, I found myself at the intersection of Broadway, 72nd Street and Amsterdam Avenue, surrounded by stately apartment buildings and well-dressed types. Right behind me was a Gray’s Papaya hot dog joint, and I figured that today was as good a time as any to start my “Who has the best hot dog in NYC?” research. Gray’s Papaya has a couple of locations in New York where they churn out hot dogs 24 hours a day and are frequented by a bunch of die-hard loyal enthusiasts. Major competition comes from some of the other ‘Papaya’ chains (so named for the papaya juice and other fruity concoctions that they sell), and more specifically from Nathan’s Famous Hot Dogs and Ruby’s Hot Dogs at Coney Island. I figured I’d have to keep it constant to be fair between the contestants, so I ordered it fairly plain, with onions and cheese only. I’m not really a massive hot dog fan, to be honest, and this one didn’t do much to change that. The bun was great and the sausage was nice, but the onions were in a sloppy tomatoey sauce and the cheese was – not surprisingly – squeezed out of a can. Still, at $2.45 I guess a person could do worse for lunch!
Feeling slightly queasy, I started walking eastwards along 72nd street towards Central Park. Wow, what a street. There was stuff going on everywhere – lots of colourful human activity and people singing and shouting. I was actually quite surprised – I mean, the Upper West Side is more known for its gentrified money magnates and stuffy conservative types than its raucous soul, isn’t it? I stopped to enjoy the sight of an old man playing a great rendition of ‘Somewhere Over The Rainbow’ on his saxophone, and smiled when I saw a man and his blind friend sitting in the sun; the man was reading a book aloud to his friend, and the friend was snorting and guffawing at events in the narrative. I briefly considered getting myself a (hippy hippy) shake from a juice bar which was packed with people, only to discover that all the shakes were made with soy milk, none of them contained any fruit I actually liked and (third and final nail in the coffin) I was still feeling a bit iffy after the hot dog, so I just enjoyed the sight and gave it a miss. I stopped at a shoe shop window to admire a pair of high-heeled shoes that I would NEVER be able to pull off (or, indeed, stand upright in), and nearly jumped out of my skin when a shout rang out nearby. A VERY large African-American woman with purple hair and electric blue sparkly leggings (with matching jacket, no less) had spotted another woman nearby in a sexy summer dress. “CUTE OUTFIT!!!!” she screamed, with an approving wink, “GO GIRL!!!! GO ON WIT YOUR BAD SELF!!!!” With a flourish of her wrist and a wave of her hand, she disappeared into the throng, and I was totally charmed. The woman she had been addressing looked a bit befuddled before realising she’d just received an awesome compliment; she smiled with more than a hint of pride, adjusted her dress, and kept walking.
I turned from this nice little scene, and not long afterwards found myself face-to-face with a building I knew very well, but had not remembered was on this street: The Dakota. Ugh. Like a dark little troll, it squats on the corner of 72nd Street and Central Park West. Look, I know that lots of people yammer on about its brilliant features and its late-1800s wicked-ass French architectural influences and yada yada yada, but quite frankly, I think it’s ugly. It looks like somewhere the Wicked Witch or the Evil Stepmother/Queen would live. Not only that, but it also happens to be the place where John Lennon lived and (more famously) died, right in the front entry way. For me, it’s hard to separate the event from the place. Ugh. Apparently, though, Yoko Ono still lives there; I’m not sure how she does it, every day passing by the place where her husband was shot by a nutso fan. Apparently the building is on some National Register of Historic Places; it’s one of the oldest buildings – if not THE oldest – in this part of Manhattan, built when New York life was still pretty much focused on Lower Manhattan and the area around it was basically empty. It’s been home to the elite rich and famous since it was built. Whatever. It gives off evil vibes and I don’t like it! I walked past the entrance as quickly as possible, unable to stop myself from rolling my eyes when I saw a South American couple taking smiling pictures of each other in the doorway where Lennon was shot. Good lord. I can see them sharing the pictures when they get home. “So this is me LAUGHING in the spot where a man was brutally gunned down in COLD BLOOD, isn’t it awesome?!” Lovely.
I came out from under the shadow of the beast, crossed the road, and before I knew it I was in the sunshine in Central Park. Yippee! This area of the park, closest to his home, is Strawberry Fields – a memorial garden for John Lennon. It was designed in a tear-drop shape, and its most popular attraction is the ‘Imagine’ mosaic. I’d seen it once before, towards the end of a long day of walking. The sun was going down and nobody was around, so I came, I saw, and I ran back out to the safety of the street. This time was a very different story, however. I came upon the mosaic seen at its best: dotted with dappled sunlight streaming through the leaves above, surrounded by people, and decorated with flowers, pictures, fresh strawberries (!), stuffed toys and other memorabilia left there by fans and friends. The afternoon was presided over by the self-proclaimed Mayor of Strawberry Fields himself, a Mr Gary “something”, who told the assembled crowd a little bit about himself and John Lennon. Apparently Gary’s been decorating the mosaic and talking to crowds here for years and years, making his living through tips from tourists. There was a group of bored-looking teens, obviously on a school trip from some country backwater; one or two of them looked interested but the majority looked positively catatonic, staring at their feet or their phones or anything else rather than listen and look. I was about to get all indignant when I realised that Lennon died nearly 20 years before some of these kids were even born; they have their own pop icons to be interested in, even if I don’t really find any of them particularly good. Is the music of John Lennon still relevant today? Does the message of ‘Imagine’ still resonate? Well, with me it does, but that’s not necessarily the case for everyone, especially for kids who missed the whole phenomenon. I suspect they were in Central Park because their teacher wanted to be there, and that they would much rather have been out misbehaving in Times Square or shopping on Fifth Avenue or just chasing members of the opposite sex around their hotel corridors.
…But then again, what kind of heathen Philistine ratbag doesn’t like The Beatles? Scum! ;P
I had a little tootle around the hills and dales of Strawberry Fields, enjoying the feeling of the sun on my skin, and watching locals and tourists alike lolling on the giant stone karsts that stick out of the park landscape at various intervals. I then pushed further into the park, crossing the main peripheral road and skirting the bottom of a lake. I climbed around the edge of Cherry Hill before making my way to the Bethesda Terrace, resplendent in the sunshine with its beautiful centrepiece fountain. You would probably recognise the fountain from the zillions of movies it’s been in (everything from Enchanted to Elf to Home Alone 2) – a great big angel in a circular pool, surrounded by a large red brick terrace. The lake was full of rowboats; so very, very corny but so very, very awesome. Central Park has got to be one of the most stunning man-made green spaces in the world; on a clear day, the crisp, sharp edges of the surrounding skyscrapers contrast beautifully with the greenery and the open space. It’s amazing. I dawdled on the terrace, enjoying my little bit of people-watching. A TV crew was doing vox-pops with randoms as they passed; I lingered to find out what was going on and was surprised to find they were asking some rather graphic sexual questions. Even more surprising was how willing these random people were to just answer those questions, seemingly without a moment’s hesitation! Ah, the power of TV. I wonder how many of them regretted their honesty later!
A young boy played his guitar, and an old fella on a rickety tricycle clattered past, his boom box (strapped to the rear of his trike) playing Tina Turner at ear-splitting volume. A newly-married Japanese couple came to pose for pictures in their bling, and I went to the water’s edge to get a closer look at the rowboats (mostly filled with couples) and the boathouse on the other side of the lake. I know that a scene from When Harry Met Sally was filmed out there, but I didn’t really feel like traipsing to the other side of the lake just for that, so I satisfied myself with a photo instead. I followed the edge of the lake to Bow Bridge, a beautiful old span across the narrow point of the lake, floored with hard wood. I was watching the boats slide past and enjoying the view of the city when I noticed a very odd couple in one of the boats near me. She was dressed in a stunning mango-coloured minidress; he was very handsome in his sky-blue shirt and charcoal trousers. Both were Indian, or perhaps Anglo-Indian. A little bunch of flowers sat on the bench next to her while he rowed. They would cuddle and nuzzle and stare adoringly at each other for a few minutes, and then bicker fiercely while she criticised his rowing technique and he told her off for being a bitch before asking her if she could do a better job. Then they’d go back to staring lovingly, gazing into each other’s eyes, him cupping her face and her laughing and arching her back, before launching into another round of apparently spontaneous arguments. I was so intrigued that I moved along the edge of the lake with them, following their progress, until I spotted a photographer taking snaps of them. Aha. When they got close enough, he shouted a few directions; turns out that they had just got engaged and he was taking pictures of them for the wedding invites, or something similar. Bloody hell; in between poses, they were tearing each other to shreds! When I caught the photographer’s eye, he gave a theatrical sigh and rolled his eyes heavenwards, gesturing at the two of them, whose faces were contorted with rage and spite once again. Hmmm. Well, what lovely memories they’ll have of that day… not!
I went back to the terrace, passing the guy on the trike again (still playing the same Tina Turner number… he must have had it on repeat), and entered the Lower Passage. This tunnel, fronted with stunning archways, cuts underneath the main road through the park, and leads to other areas of the park. Inside, it’s decorated with incredibly ornate tile work on the ceiling (in shades of blue and gold), painted with patterns on the walls and lit with a beautiful orange glow. Awesome, considering it’s just a passage from one place to another! I wandered through it until I came upon another open space, topped by the Bandshell. I had been hoping to find the legendary Disco Skaters here, but instead found a group of young boys on their skateboards. They seemed to be having a good time, so I sat and watched them for a while until I was distracted, first by a girl on a tightrope and then by a man teaching a little boy how to make GIANT bubbles with two wooden wands, a piece of string and a large bucket of soapy water. At first, the kid kept getting a faceful of exploded bubbles, but he eventually got the hang of it. I soon noticed that I had a fellow spectator – a rather lovely-looking man in a business suit. It wasn’t so much the suit that impressed me, as his hairdo; his hair was cut very short, and an intricate swirling pattern had been shaved into it. It’s not often that guys in business suits have the balls to do anything of that level of interest with their hair, so this guy definitely stood out from the crowd.
I left the bandshell behind and walked along The Mall, a great sweeping line of trees. I admired a couple of the statues before doing something of an about-turn, looking for the Sheep Meadow. It’s basically just a large, treeless expanse of grass which used to be – you guessed it – a sheep meadow. I walked the length of it from north to south, soaking up the sun and enjoying the views of the buildings behind the park. I saw dads spinning their kids around, teenagers hanging out in little gaggles, intense games of Ultimate Disc (frisbee, to the uninitiated), loners reading their books (I figured that that would probably be me at some point!) and about half a dozen guys in their early 20s nursing their hangovers together, falling asleep in the sun.
I then cut westwards again, and made for the Tavern On The Green. I think I mentioned it before on the day Hicham and I went to the UN, but I’ll mention it again: when I was a kid, one of my favourite books was ‘Remember Me To Harold Square’, by Paula Danziger. It follows the adventures of three kids on a scavenger hunt (nerds, just like me) in Manhattan. I remember the kids meeting for the first time – in the company of their parents, of course – at The Tavern On The Green, and I had always wanted to go there. I also remember Rick Moranis in Ghostbusters, being pursued by one of the rhino-like hell-hounds (Zuul? Clortho?) and running into Central Park, pressing himself up against the window of the Tavern, begging for help from the snotty diners who basically ignore him and go on with their dinner. I think it was also host to a scene from the excellent, EXCELLENT mini series ‘The Tenth Kingdom’ (if you haven’t seen it yet, go forth and watch it!), where the insatiable Wolf tells a confused waitress, “I want my lamb rare, and I mean rare! Like, just let it look at the oven in terror, and then bring it out to me!!!”) Anyway, suffice to say it’s played a large part in my pop culture references for New York! I was sad to find that the restaurant had actually gone bust, but had been bought (by Donald Trump, I think) and turned into a visitor centre for the park, which is not a bad end, really.
Parked outside the building were a couple of food trucks, and one of them was just what the doctor ordered after a warm day of tootling around the park in the sun: an ice cream van! However, this van was no ordinary ice-cream van. This was a Van Leeuwen ice cream truck, ladies and gentlemen. I wandered up to the window expecting to find the usual sorry list of flavours (soft-serve vanilla, soft-serve vanilla with a flake, soft-serve vanilla with chocolate topping…), but instead found the most mouth-watering and intriguing options I’ve ever seen in ice cream. Hazelnut, Espresso and Pistachio were accompanied by Balinese Palm Sugar, Ceylon Cinnamon, Gianduja and Earl Grey Tea, along with a couple of others I can’t remember. I really was spoilt for choice, but in the end I chose one scoop of Ginger, and a back-up scoop of Mint Chip in case it all went horribly wrong with the ginger. Luckily, I was not at all mistaken with my choice and there began an obsession with ginger ice cream such as the world has NEVER BEFORE SEEN! The mint chip was a real winner – some of the best I’ve ever had – but the true star was the ginger. Creamy, slightly custardy, but a little spicy, you could taste real ginger in it, but it wasn’t too overpowering. It literally left my mouth watering for more, and for a good ten minutes I had a fierce internal debate, but I just couldn’t do it with a clear conscience. Instead, I asked the guy behind the counter if he could supply with me some water to drink, which he kindly did, and I forced myself to turn around and walk away from the van empty-handed. BE IMPRESSED WITH MY WILL POWER!!!!! Mmmm, just thinking about it now makes me salivate…. in the following weeks, I tried a helluva lot of ginger ice cream from all over the place, but I truly reckon that the Van Leeuwen was the best. NOM NOM NOM!
Tickled pink with my new culinary discovery, I decided to make my way out of the park. I walked past the baseball fields, filled with kids playing serious (and some not-so-serious) after-school games, and I found the spot where, about 10 years ago on a previous trip to New York, I had been taught the finer points of baseball by an old Jewish gentleman from Brooklyn. I had hired a bike for a whirl around the park on a Sunday afternoon, and had stopped to watch a game played between two groups of adults, all of whom looked like they were maybe Puerto Rican or Dominican. The old man had struck up a conversation with me, and when he found out that I was British (which was where I was living at the time), he decided to give me an education on ‘America’s sport’. He complained that ‘the players these days’ didn’t have any manners in the game, and almost as if to punctuate his remark, the batter in the game we were watching started screaming his head off. He had had three strikes against him, and instead of retreating gracefully he argued with the umpire, threw his bat violently into the air, slammed his hat in the dirt, yelled some more, tore his bright orange team shirt off and threw it on the ground, ran around in circles shouting and then roared with fury before stalking back to the sidelines after a physical threat from the umpire. I still remember the vein across his shaved head bulging, and how the other team members rolled their eyes. The old man said, “See? Told you.” Apparently the old gentleman used to be a baseball coach, and then an umpire himself. His wife had died some years previously, and so to pass the time he spent his weekends hanging out in Central Park, watching any game that was being played. He seemed lonely; he was 82 at the time and I wonder now if he’s still alive. Such a nice man.
Anyway, after my trip down memory lane, I kept walking south, holding my nose any time I passed the horse-drawn carriages that seem to be unavoidable in the park. I get the fact that a horse-drawn carriage ride is fun, nostalgic and romantic, and that in particular a horse-drawn carriage ride in Central Park is basically an iconic thing to do in NYC, but honestly… the STENCH. Those horses absolutely reek. I can’t imagine trying to get cuddly with someone in a carriage when my primary instinct would just be to retch from the smell of horse poop and generally sweaty horsiness. Pew. Poor horsies!
I exited the park from the south-west corner, at Columbus Circle. A frenetic centre of energy, people, traffic and noise, the Circle is also home to a statue of Christopher Columbus (of course), Trump Tower (with its giant steel globe – talk about an 80s icon), and the relatively new Time Warner Centre. I can’t say for sure, but I seem to remember that when plans were first made for the centre, there was a lot of controversy. People didn’t want a shopping centre in Manhattan; they were worried that it would ruin the traditional ‘feel’ of the shopping scene, which is basically made of of storefronts on the street in most parts of the island. There was concern that it would lead to a swathe of shopping centres, and that New York would become an endless swathe of strip malls and megamalls like the rest of the States, ruining the ‘neighbourhood’ atmosphere. Now, I don’t know how much I agree with some of these arguments (assuming that my memory is serving me well and that I’m not just making all this up in my head!), but I understand the concern. Part of New York’s charm is places like Fifth Avenue, and little enclaves like the West Village, where even the chain stores have a little bit of individual pizzazz and independent boutiques flourish. The Time Warner Centre does look pretty impressive, though, perched there on the corner, and along with corporate offices it seems to have gained quite a few high-profile (mega-money) stores including Armani, Hugo Boss and Swarovski, to name a few. My interest in it, though, was for one reason only: Jazz At Lincoln Centre.
So, for all you music lovers out there, Jazz At Lincoln Centre is AWESOME. ‘Curated’ by Wynton Marsalis (yes, of the ridiculously talented Marsalis clan, which includes Branford, Ellis, and Jason, to name but a few), the JALC programme runs loads of jazz concerts and talks throughout the year. They even have children’s programmes, to encourage their interest in music, and singalong sessions. Totally. Freaking. Amazing. Before coming to New York I had salivated over their programme, whittling my list of potential visits down to about 5, and then narrowing that down to one concert – an evening of The Music of Jelly Roll Morton, who was a New Orleans jazz musician. He died in 1941 but his notoriety lives on – he claimed to have invented jazz music (!) and was totally up his own ass, by some accounts, but his back catalogue of music is a rollicking ride of brilliant toe-tapping ragtime and catchy bum-wiggling tunes. I had it penned in as ‘DEFINITE’ on my list of things to do in New York…. and then I saw the price. Tickets were around $90, if I remember correctly, and with all the other things I wanted to do, all the shows I wanted to see, and a budget that had to stretch for two more months, I realised that I just couldn’t do it all. Sadly, after much self-torture and hemming and hawing, the Music of Jelly Roll Morton was out of the question for me.
And so it was that my eyes scanned Columbus Circle as I exited Central Park, skirted around a busking drummer (who sounded strangely more like a tap dancer) and fell upon the sign for Jazz At Lincoln Centre above one of the doorways at the Time Warner Centre. I had forgotten that some of the venues were not at the Lincoln Centre proper, and were in fact here instead. I also realised that the concert was tonight, in a matter of hours. I stared wistfully at the sign, and tried to convince myself that I could afford that $90 (plus taxes), but to no avail. Still, I thought that maybe I could wander in and, you know, just LOOK at the ticket booth…
Celebrity Interlude: Pulling open the doors to the centre, I slammed headfirst into Tim Robbins’ chest. I looked up, realised that I was staring at Mr Shawshank Redemption himself, and gibbered. He glanced at the Scary Crazy Lady (TM) in front of him, apologised, smiled nervously, checked that I was righted, and scurried away. I gibbered to myself a bit more, scaring a few passers-by, then kicked myself for not asking him to marry me, and went through the doorway.
Where were we? Ah yes. The JALC ticket booth. I loitered around, and thought that maybe, MAYBE, with a magic wand or something, an angel of the Lord had magically changed the ticket prices between now and the time I’d checked the prices on line. I went to the window and asked the lady how much tickets were. No, there had been no divine intervention. They were still $90. I stood there, dithering, doing some maths to figure out if I could cancel something else or shuffle some money around, or maybe not eat for a few days… I must have looked really, really disappointed and pathetic, because the lady behind the counter softened suddenly. “You don’t have $90?” No. “But you really want to see the show?” Yes. “Hmmm. Well, I guess I could… wait a second.” She disappeared for a couple of minutes. “It’s just you, right?” Yes. “Do you have $10? I can give you a ticket for tonight for $10.” Honestly, I was so shocked and excited that I nearly peed my pants. I wanted to leap over the counter and give the woman a giant hug and blubber gratefully all over her shoulder, but lucky for her there was a glass barrier between us.
And that was that. I emerged from the Time Warner Centre clutching my very own ticket to The Music of Jelly Roll Morton at Jazz at Lincoln Centre for Friday May 11th, dazed and confused and terribly delighted. I don’t know if they do that as a matter of course (I guess it wouldn’t be unusual to sell discounted tickets on the same day as the show, just like the Broadway shows do), but either way I felt like I’d just won the lottery. I checked my watch, and I had just enough time to race home and clean myself up before returning for the show.
When I got back to the hostel, I quickly showered and changed into my girly dress, slapped on a bit of lipstick and inspected myself in the mirror. One of my room-mates, the Brazilian guy who was travelling with his girlfriend, came in and asked what I was all dressed up for; I told him that I’d got $10 tickets for a show and he was suitably impressed. He asked if he could get such a deal, but when he found out that it was jazz he suddenly lost interest…!
I got back onto the subway, feeling real purty, and went back to Columbus Circle. There was a crowd of people down by the ticket booth waiting for the lifts up to the concert venue – it took a fair while to get everybody up there! Well, up I went along with them, and had just enough time to grab a (stupendously overpriced) bottle of water before it was time to sit down. The Rose Theatre was basically full. It looked just as I imagined – a terribly sophisticated concert hall with all sorts of acoustic features that I could never begin to understand, decorated in muted tones of navy blue, brown and pink uplighting. It was actually a fairly small room, probably designed specifically to create an ‘intimate’ atmosphere.
The musicians came out to raucous applause (I was delighted to see Jason Marsalis was the drummer), and the leader, a blind pianist called Marcus Roberts, came out last. I’m not much good at describing music, particularly when it’s largely instrumental, but WOW. Kickass New Orleans rolling jazz. I was bouncing in my seat (along with a large part of the audience), clapping along and just generally having an awesome time. There were two Korean girls sitting next to me; they sat through the first half still as stones, left at the interval, and never came back. Bizarre. Speaking of the interval: as I left the theatre, two old blue-rinsed ladies wearing white gloves pointed, tutted and gave me filthy looks. I looked down to see what they were pointing at, thinking that maybe I had a run in my tights or (God forbid) had tucked my skirt into my tights at some point, but could only see my shoes. Then I realised that, according to them, the problem WAS my shoes. Apparently ankle-high black Doc Martens are not the appropriate shoe of choice to go with a super-girly black and red flowered dress. At least, not according to the Ladies Who Lunch Brigade. I modelled my shoes for them, pointing my toes and giving them an evil cheeky smile; I stopped short of poking out my tongue, but they were appalled and scuttled off, shaking their heads and tutting some more, probably about the state of youth today. Silly old bats. Let’s see how well THEY’D manage their wardrobes if they could only take what they could carry! (Plus, as a side note, I bet these are the same old hags who tut over the lack of music appreciation in youth today, and bemoan the fact that nobody comes to enjoy live instrumental music any more. Well, perhaps if young folk were welcomed a bit more – and criticised a bit less – by old farts like them, they would feel inclined to try out these sorts of concerts more often!)
Anyway, the intermission was almost as eventful as the main event. A Brooklyn band called the Red Hook Ramblers was playing a lively turn of New Orleans jazz, ranging from toe-tapping high-speed numbers to slow, bluesy, naughty ditties; people were even dancing on the spot. It’s nice to see a jazz audience that aren’t all a bunch of stuffy socialites intent on one-upping each other with pretentious name-dropping (those old ladies notwithstanding, of course). A real scene with real people who really love it; I was happy to be there.
The second half of the main show was every bit as good as the first. My seat was in the back of the auditorium, but I could still see the performers’ faces perfectly. We all swayed and soared with the music. At the end, I clapped until my hands were sore, then wandered out through the empty corridors of the Time Warner Centre and crossed the road into Columbus Circle. It was late and I was tired, but not ready to head home right away, so I sat on a bench in Columbus Circle for a while enjoying the spray of the fountains, the lighting, and a bit of people-watching. There was a guy slooping around the obelisk on his roller blades and a family taking photos and letting their kids dip toes into the fountains; a man of about my age sat reading his book. For a moment I wondered what he was doing out there by himself reading – didn’t he have a home to go to? – but then I supposed that the same question could have been asked of me… and his answer was probably the same as mine. It was too nice a night to be indoors alone. After a good half an hour of just breathing, I finally decided to call it a night. I hopped on the subway and before I knew it, I was curled up in bed for my last night at the hostel – tomorrow I would be in new digs, and truly living on my own in New York.
Thanks for stopping by,
Tara.
Born in Hong Kong and raised all over the world, I've been tootling around for 33 years now. A Spanish friend of mine once said that "the smallest pot has the finest marmalade"... I have to agree with her! I'm small but I can still make 6-foot Brazilian bodybuilders cry if the need arises. And I never need to whinge about legroom on a plane!
little tara 