small bites of a big city

A week ago we moved our youngest into her dorm, which was pretty exhausting on all levels for everyone involved. Luckily, we had spend some days prior to this exploring the city. We had a room on the 24th floor of a hotel-  interestingly, this did not even feel that high when looking out the window.

nighttime view

The first night, we ate Persian food (at Pars), served by a Russian (?) waitress. There are choices for vegetarians and vegans everywhere in the city, and the food is imaginative and good. What a joy! (for us)

We roamed around 'the villages' and Chelsea, where you can find signs and remains of the Dutch reign long ago. Now this is a brilliant, vibrant, multi-cultural area. We walked a fair length of the High Line, a park build along elevated train tracks- I definitely recommend it! (http://www.thehighline.org/).

daytime view

We made it to the Rose Reading Room in the central library. The Chelsea Market. The Risotteria in Greenwhich Village. We walked and walked.

My love wished to see the Frick Collection- now Mr. Frick was not really PC in his day and age but at least he left us a marvelous collection of the art he managed to buy with his unethically obtained riches.

Sir Thomas Moore, not Mr. Frick

Emma joined her friends in Central Park to hang out and model during a photography workshop, while my love and I took an enjoyable ride on the ferry. We found a large-ish farmer's market on Union Square where the produce was fresh and the prices better than at our hometown supermarket.

We walked around the financial district which is not as boring as it sounds. We landed on sidewalk cafe chairs with a view of the freedom tower, under the Brooklyn bridge, and had a lengthy conversation with an Austrian-American who shared -among others- the story about the seven feet of water that had covered this part of lower Manhattan. He explained the empty and or boarded up houses and businesses. The restaurant was one of the first to open back up after the Sandy-damage. So we stayed and watched the sky grow dark-blue and were joined by Emma and two of her friends for dinner, right there on the sidewalk.

We experienced the convenience and aggravation of using the subway (you get places fast, if the train stops where you need to be anyway, and that really can change on a moment's notice while you are riding).

We hugged our girl and left her and her room mate to sort out the details of living together in their very small and very impractically laid out dorm room with as best feature the large windows they had to block with their desks in order to be able to walk around the obstacles.

My love and I had dinner in  'the landmark where Washington famously bid farewell to his men at the close of the Revolutionary War in 1783' and met Bob the drag queen on our way back.

Well, that's him but the picture does not do him much justice. He is, like the lady who sat next to him said "quite fabulous". She took pictures, I did not. You can find him on facebook,  vine, and twitter (and I quote: "I'm not really on twitter but they say you have to have a twitter so I'm on").

And then we drove back, all the way home. Together. Just the two of us. The texts are trickling in: Thijs finally has electricity but no word on the gas yet; Vera's studio class professors are very nice however the content of the class unexpected; Emma has attended welcome week activities and purchased herbs for her window sill. And we are working to pay off all this fabulousness and doing homey things such as cuddle with the cats and bake cinnamon rolls.