NYE in NY NY

Not long to go until midnight and the start of 2011. (It's 10.20 pm Friday.) Just been talking to someone who got here over 12 hours ago to bag a good spot for the NYE party. Said New Year's Eve in Times Square was on her bucket list.

Snowmaggedon

First time outside in 2 days into the white chaos of NY's Snowmageddon III, in time to head over to Bryant Park and its 100+ temporary "holiday shops" festival. Just the thing to ease the end-of-year chills.

The Iceman Cometh

What is it with Americans and ice? Do they eat the stuff? Do they put it in the bath tub to lower the water temperature?

Our New York hotel room is three doors away from the corner. Around the corner there is another door before you get to the ice machine for our floor.

It’s a nice ice machine and seems to work well.

The problem is that each room has an ice bucket. A large ice bucket.

The ice bucket is made of a hard plastic and has double walls for insulation. That means it acts like a drum.

So when you go to the nice ice machine, put your bucket under the spout and press the button, a small avalanche of ice cubes rattles down the chute and crashes into your bucket with a noise like thunder that is ampified by the double-skin drum into the sound of a building collapsing.

This would not be too bad if it wasn’t for the American obsession with ice.

After a hard day’s work being a tourist, you are just drifting off to sleep knowing that you have to get up early to do it all again tomorrow, when you are startled awake by the sound of a building collapsing next door.

“What the…?” Oh, it’s somebody at the ice machine.

You settle, then ten minutes later the thunder crashes and the building collapses again.

And it goes on. There seems to be a procession of people going to the ice machine, filling up bucket after bucket with ice. Some nights it goes on until 1.30 in the morning.

You can ignore the car horns and police sirens, they are mere whispers in the distance compared to this. It’s obvious that some people go back several times, because there are far more crashes from the machine than there are rooms on this floor. What are they doing with it all?

Even Reuben noticed. Usually a sound sleeper, he decided to check in to our hotel one night rather than have to drag himself back first thing next morning. He had done a late interview round the corner at the Ed Sullivan Theatre with one of Letterman’s guests, and had an early morning appointment next day over the road at Carnegie Hall. The stand-by room rate was about the same as a taxi home and back again.

By one of the coincidences that follow Reuben around, he got the room next to ours. There is a connecting door between the two rooms. Although it was locked, we could hear Reuben muttering to himself every time the ice rattled and crashed into someone’s bucket.

Everytime it happened he got more and more cranky. By 1.30 am he was hopping mad. That’s when I thought, “Oh-oh! Reuben is upset”.

He doesn’t get upset often, but when he does you can bet he won’t take it lying down. But Reuben’s mind doesn’t work like most other people’s.

Around 3 am I had just gone to the bathroom when I heard Reuben’s door open and his unmistakeable footsteps go past our room. He was going to the ice machine.

I don’t know what he used for an ice bucket, but it must have been huge – maybe one of the large rubbish bins from the foyer. Whatever it was, it sounded like the mother of all ice buckets because the crashing seemed to go on forever. No one could have slept through it.

When it stopped at last, Reuben lurched up and down the corridor, rattling the can and calling out in his best Quasimodo voice , “Anybody want any f#*%ing ice?”

New York Impressions

Manhattan feels sometimes like a large village, not at all the big, scary city that everyone talks about.

Most of the time, people don’t actually look up at the buildings. After a while, your eyes rarely go above the level of the street signs as you navigate around, so you quickly forget about all that tall stuff overhead.

Everywhere you look reminds you of a movie or a song:

• The rumble of the subway trains, the lullaby of Broadway;
• Tiffany’s;
• Steam coming out of roadway vents in numerous movies;
• 59th Street Bridge (…feelin’ groovy);
• They say the neon lights are bright (On Broadway);
• The soup kitchen from Seinfeld (at 259A West 55th Street);
• Radio City Music Hall;
• Tavern on the Green in Central Park (in both “Wall Street” and where a snarling hell-hound chased Rick Moranis in Ghostbusters);
• 55 Central Park West “Spook Central” where the Ghostbusters battled the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man;
• Rockefeller Center (30 Rock);
• Underneath the IRT Bridge at 125th St in Harlem,scene of many car chases.

Walking in New York

“Don’t try to walk more than 10 blocks”, our daughter advised us from New York a fortnight earlier.

Much of New York is surprisingly walkable. You probably wouldn’t want to walk from Central Park to Battery Park (about 90 blocks), but the theatre district and midtown areas are manageable if the weather is kind.

On our first full day, we explored solely on foot. First we walked down Broadway (12 blocks ) then east along 42nd Street (4 blocks) to find the departure point for our Washington trip the following day. It was on the corner of Park Avenue and 42nd, opposite Grand Central Station, where the rail tracks go above Park Ave on an ornate, cast iron viaduct.

After a quick look round Grand Central Concourse – remarkably familiar from many movies and TV shows – we walked one block south to 41st then two blocks west along “Library Way” to the New York Public Library on Fifth Ave. It wasn’t open yet, so we walked another two blocks down Fifth Ave to Lord and Taylors department store to look for jeans for Ann and brunch. We found the food but not the jeans.

By now we had walked 21 blocks.

We headed back up 5th Ave (1 block) and west on 40th alongside the Library (still not open) and Bryant Park to 6 Ave (2 blocks).

It is six blocks more down to 6th Ave (Avenue of the Americas) to Herald Square where Broadway crosses 6th Ave and 34th St.

We are now standing at Macy’s Herald Square entrance. We have walked 30 blocks.

In Macy’s we buy stuff. As you do.

But they don’t stock the brand of jeans that Ann wants. “They have them in Lord and Taylors”, the assistant tells us.

So we walk back a different way: one block east along 34th Street to where the Empire State Building towers over the junction with 5th Avenue . The lines for the trip to the top are long. Oh well, another time.

Then five blocks up Fifth Ave gets us to back to L & T where this time we find where they have hidden those darn jeans. Then it’s one more block to the NY Public Library.

We have a brief look round and wished we had a couple of days to see it properly.

Then it’s a repeat of the two blocks east to 6th Ave and Bryant Park where we have juice and water and sit for a while and enjoy the outdoor reading library, the chess games at tables under the trees, gentle buskers and many people from the nearby buildings having lunch in this little oasis.

We have now walked 39 blocks.

After our brief rest, it’s now one more block over to Broadway and then a pleasant stroll a mere 14 blocks north via Times Square back to our hotel to put our feet up and savour the coffees that we picked up on the way.

Our walking total for the day so far is 53 blocks.

In the evening we walk another three blocks east and two north towards the Trump Tower and Tiffany’s checking out restaurants before we find somewhere to eat on the return journey past Carnegie Hall.

Those 10 evening blocks take our walking total for the day to 63 blocks.

In spite of that, we don’t get to sleep very easily. There is a huge storm with lightning hitting the tops of nearby buildings and massive crashes of thunder. In amongst the racket, there seems to be a competition for the loudest car horn and the most police sirens per minute.

Times Square

During coffee, my mobile rings. It’s Reuben. “Ian, are you anywhere near Times Square?”

I tell him we’re about five minutes walk away. “Great. Could you take a look around and give me 100 words on the scene down there by 1 am, please?”

I ask him to explain. “Oh, sorry. I’m covering the Tony Awards tonight and I need a few lines about the Times Square angle. You’ll see when you get there. Oh, and there’s something else…”.

“Yes, what?”

“Welcome to New York”.

Times Square

We finish our coffee and head down to Times Square.

It’s not really a square, it’s two triangles formed where Broadway crosses over Seventh Avenue.

If you picture Seventh Avenue running from 12 o’clock to 6 o’clock, Broadway runs across it from 11 o’clock to 5 o’clock. The crossroads form a tall, narrow “X” bounded by 42nd Street at the bottom and 47th Street at the top. The two narrow triangles are between the upper and lower arms of the “X”.

Technically, only the bottom triangle is Times Square; the top triangle is Duffy Square. But everyone calls the whole complex “Times Square”.

Times Square is packed. Seventh Avenue and the cross streets are closed to vehicles. A narrow traffic lane is marked with orange cones and cars creep through.

Everywhere else is crowded with people, not just on the sidewalks but also on the large areas of closed-off roadway. They sit on deckchairs, camping chairs, plastic chairs and folding stools. There are thousands of them, packing into the car-free spaces, sitting facing the huge outdoor plasma screens which dominate the neon advertising on the sides of the surrounding buildings.

I ask a cheerful cop what’s the story. He explains that New York is trialling closing off various parts of Times Square to traffic to see which configuration works best for pedestrians and traffic flow. But he too is surprised by the huge turn-out this Sunday night.

Everyone is watching the screens which are showing the Tony Awards presentations live from Radio City Music Hall only one block over and three blocks north.

The crowd is in a great mood. They have snacks and drinks. People are cheerful and talking excitedly to each other, friends and strangers alike. They cheer and clap enthusiastically at each announcement.

As we watch, “Billy Elliott” picks up yet another Award. That makes it ten for the night. Our chance of picking up tickets for the show as we’d hoped at the discount booth in Times Square has just dropped to zero.

Coming to New York

The SuperShuttle whisks us off to Manhattan. We go through three separate tolls booths on the 30 minute journey.

As the New York midtown skyline comes into view before we plunge into the tunnel under the river, the sight is exciting in one way, but slightly disappointing in another. It’s getting dark – not dark enough for the lights to really make an impact – and a bit misty so the view is not very clear. But it’s not as tall as I imagined. Maybe it’s the distance and the poor light.

Ann and I are the second drop-off from the crowded mini-bus. I hear my voice say to the driver, “Corner of Broadway and 54th, please”, and I like saying it very much.

Ameritania Hotel, Broadway

The Ameritania Hotel is right on the corner of Broadway and the cross street, about 5 blocks north of Times Square. The hotel is looking a bit tired, but the staff are cheerful and the rooms are clean.

Inside my suitcase is a polite letter from the Dept of Homeland Security saying that my case was one of those chosen at random to be opened. Not a problem, I fitted it with TSA approved locks so that security people could open it for inspection without having to bust anything.

The “random” aspect makes me smile. On the top layer of my case is all my electronic gear. Each in its dedicated pouch, I pack chargers, leads and accessories for my digital camera, two mobile phones, netbook computer and GPS. It must have looked like an electronics lab on the x-ray.

I put the pouches on top of everything else so that inspectors won’t have to rummage through the whole case to check anything that might interest them. Either it works, or they are darn skilful at their job, because if it wasn’t for the notice, you couldn’t tell that it had been examined.

We are getting hungry, so down in the lobby we ask the guy behind the desk where he recommends for a not-too-expensive dinner. He brightens up that we are asking his advice. He asks what kind of food we like and is even more interested when we suggest Italian.

Angelo’s is the place. We step out of the entrance on 54th Street, go round the corner onto Broadway and Angelo’s is a couple of doors down, next door to the old Ed Sullivan Theatre where the Late Show with David Letterman Show is recorded.

Angelo’s is an old-style, traditional Italian restaurant. We take a table on the ground floor in the window facing onto Broadway. As you do.

So our first evening in New York sees us eating spaghetti and meatballs in an Italian restaurant on Broadway.

It’s a gas.