Angels of New Dork

I still love this city.

Before I arrived in New York I expected it to be all concrete and grey and busy and smoggy and full of street vendors and taxi drivers and crying babies and fat Americans and homeless people and muggers and Broadway dancers. I haven’t seen any homeless people (though I have still only stayed in either the city or the suburbs), and the poor people I have seen have all been industriously emptying rubbish bins for cans and bottles to recycle (which is why I no longer recycle them myself. It’s good for the planet and helps out those less fortunate than I!).

I took a walk to Central Park yesterday and was completely surprised by how big it was. I was expecting it to be no bigger than a small public park, not unlike Frank Kitts back in Wellington. Instead it takes up a large portion of my map of the city, and is filled with trees, wild (rabid?) animals, lakes, reservoirs, fountains, buskers, kids waggins school, and pretty pretty pretty trees.

I entered the park through the South Gate, and passed a whole slew of horse drawn carriages ready to take people on a tour of the greenery for around $35 for half an hour. I thought about it, I did. But in the end I decided to explore on my own for a bit, and maybe save the horse drawn cart for another time. I imagine it would be quite a lovely thing to do at night, but I am very naïve.

Wandering the park for a while, I found the angel fountain (from the TV series “Angels of New York”), where I sat down and listened to some buskers for a while, and also did some work on my laptop. It was all very lovely, until a bunch of teenage boys (who I lovingly referred to as ‘the Jewness Brothers”) came and started showing off to a bunch of equally pubescent young ladies what fine young menches they were. It was as hilarious as it was awkward, and I was doing well not to burst into laughter until one of them chose his method of impressment as his ‘awesome ability to tie a Windsor knot’.

The girls left, laughing.

So did I.