Playing Injured

Bruce and I are just back from five days in New York, and here's a picture of the Brooklyn Bridge to prove it.

Last time we were in NYC was November 2010, and, really, the place has changed a lot.

First of all, the new World Trade Tower has broken ground and then some. A friend observed to me recently that the new tower looks ever so much like an extended middle finger. 

At 7 World Trade Centre, a fountain featuring a monumental Jeff Koons balloon sculpture has been installed, a tribute to those who survived the 9/11 attacks. Signs explain to visitors that this is private property and many activities are not permitted including playing in the fountain. Cue photo of cute little kid playing in the fountain.

We saw too many things and had too much fun during our visit to share in a single short blog post. 

I propose to add bits to future posts. For today, I'll review the highlights.



Best thing we should have done long ago: New York Public Library. We went inside the New York Public Library after many previous visits where we gawked only at the outside. It is splendid indoors. A show featuring children's books transported me to my happy childhood when I spent hours dug deep in Charlotte's Web, Pippi Longstocking and stories about Winnie-the-Pooh. 

The actual toys Sheperd based his drawings on.

Best new find: The Rubin Museum. Founded in 1999, this small, modern museum houses an amazing collection of art from the Himalayas. The pieces are spectacular, the curation scholarly and, what we enjoyed the most about the space, the crowds of fellow-museum-goers very, very small. Nowadays people treat visits to the Met and the MOMA like trips to Coney Island. Giant, raucous groups of families and friends rove the museums, posing with artworks like they were cardboard facsimiles of movie stars, making a huge racket. Need a new, quiet, beautiful place to go? Try the Rubin.

Best food: Bruce and I usually have bad luck trying to find good places to eat anywhere, not just NYC. This time, we ate well no matter where we went. And the very best place was our second choice after we found out the Oyster Bar in Grand Central Terminal wasn't open on Sunday. A quick search on Yelp took us to Nirvana, a new Indian food place. We had our misgivings about the menu, but ordered some likely-sounding dishes and oh, man, were they good. The waiter came by to clear the table of the 100% clean dishes and smiled as he asked the unnecessary question of whether we had enjoyed our meal.

Best new New York neighbourhood: Brooklyn. We have always stayed in Manhattan before this, but got some really cheap digs (basically renting someone's bedroom through airBnB) in the Fort Greene neighbourhood in Brooklyn. Brooklyn is historic, green, diverse and full of young people. It has its own major green space Prospect Park, a major art museum and a big botanical garden that, due to a navigation error, we spent more time walking around than walking in, but what we saw when we got there was pretty cool.

Brightly-coloured water lilies.

125-year-old Japanese White Pine bonsai

Those are the highlights. The only thing I have left to do is explain the title to this post: "Playing Injured."

We went to NYC this time in the enjoyable company of our dear friends Kate and Ed. Here's Kate posing with a sewer alligator sculpture in Brooklyn.

This bronze cast is part of a multi-piece work - Life Underground by Tom Otterness - installed
around the subway station close to where this photo was taken.

Here are Kate and Ed with Super Mario in Times Square.

Last time we vacationed with K&E, we were in St. Augustine, Florida and I was hobbling around with an injured left foot. I learned after returning to Canada that I'd walked the length and breadth of the US's oldest city with a hairline fracture in my third metatarsal. 

I cannot holiday with these friends without a broken bone somewhere, apparently. A couple of weeks before our departure to NYC, I cracked a rib in yoga class (go figure). 

Other than using this injury as an excuse to not participate in the world's largest open air yoga class on June 21st in Times Square, it didn't bother me.

"Mind Over Madness" - as mad a public display of yoga as I have ever seen. This is a small part of the crowd, and shows only one class, many more of which were held over the day. An estimated 15,000 people participated. 

Thanks for reading! Have a great week!

Karen