A Photo from the Past

Today, I dipped into my Flickr pile to find a photograph taken on a previous May 14th. I found this from 2005. It was my first trip with Jay to NYC.


Here's a blog entry from that day.

Hours & Hours of Fuzzy Vacation Video!

Yesterday, I posted a YouTube video of our recent camping trip here. In addition, I recalled uploading two, other short summer roads trips from 2013 and 2014. So, I included an hour's worth of video in the blog entry.

As we might say in the vernacular: That ain't nothing yet!

I vowed to take a bit of time to organize old, trip videos today. Once about a decade ago, I plugged old camcorders into a 'capture card' of an old PC. It was state of the art at the time, but I bet I could do a lot better today with a cheap USB device. Nevertheless, I did have some old video data on DVDs. Some of that analog video made it onto YouTube. Also, for a while, we had a camcorder that saved as AVCHD which could be read by Blu-ray players. My ancient Sony PlayStation is in a closet. Converting those discs takes a lot more effort in getting online. As proof, I have hours of video from Italy in 2008 which has yet to see online life. As well, there must have been big gaps when we didn't own a working camcorder.

I knew I needed to get a little more organized. Today, I did make a list of what was and wasn't on my YouTube channel. I had to make a new playlist and still utalize a paper and pen to organize the listings. I'm not done.

In fact right at the moment, the YouTube site is almost finished converting 22 minutes of fuzzy, old analog footage. This was our first trip together to New York city in 2005. The video had a title which only mentioned the month of May. Luckily, this journal goes back to 2003, so it was a simple matter to look up the events of that trip.


There is still a whole lot of work left and sometimes it hardly seems worth the effort. Yet, then again, I can look back to see how things (and we) looked in Thailand in 1991. Oh my gosh!

This will never be of interest to the world at large but I have to thank YouTube for making it possible for me to warehouse more than a straight day of video. If it's online I have much more of a chance to review something than if it is on a tape, in the back, on the top shelf of a cupboard.

102 Floors

It happens every time we're about to go on a vacation; that's the time we dust off the old Sony camcorder. It sits in the cupboard except for when we're going off of a journey. We always run around at the last minute asking whether there are any blank tapes.

Today was no exception, even though we're not leaving until Thursday for Germany. I guess that shows we're slightly more organized than usual. I'm not convinced though.

As it happens we don't have any blank tape, I wondered whether it'd be okay to shoot over old video. As long as I can verify that the original is safely on DVD, then it should be all right. I found a tape with a trip to NYC taken in the spring of 2005. All the footage is all on disk, so that's one tape that will be reused. Just so you'll know that I checked, here's a YouTube clip.

Everybody who visits New York City probably goes up the Empire State Building. Although its 102 floors are greater than the 101 of Taipei 101, the building isn't nearly as tall. All will be dwarfed by Burj Dubai's projected 162 floors slated for completion in 2009.

Of course the slightly-sickening, zooming and dodging camera work is Jay's responsibility . . .

Less Than Six Months Ago?

I don't know how this photo was skipped in my uploads to Flickr on the first go around. Sometimes, I worry that there are a great many places in the world to which I want to visit but not enough years of life to reach them all.



We did a fair job this year making it to NYC, London, and Paris. We also saw Frankfurt, Brussels, and Amsterdam. Oh, and I mustn't forget July's trip to Portland, OR. It's surely a world city too!

Things Are Looking Up

Vacation photos are generally funny creatures. They usually consist of 'one -of -me -in -front -of -this -famous -object' or 'us -standing -with -a -vista -behind -us'. After vacationers return to a familar old rut, I guess the pictures act as the definite proof of actually having been away.

Occasionally, even on a vacation, a scene can catch my eye though. I call the resulting attempts my 'artsy' photos. We were in NYC a short enough time so that I never neglected to look up when outside. Here are two examples of the reason why:


Image #1 Image #2

Click on either picture to view a larger version in a new browser window.

Why Vacations are Important

Vacations are good for you. First, they are great because they throw a person out of any ordinary routine. One is forced to regress to the most basic needs of food and shelter. In addition, most day-to-day thoughts are relegated to the back burner while new experiences overwhelm one's senses. Lastly, getting away gives one the chance to step back from life and, in a way to which one never generally admits, realize there are many different patterns for human existence. One becomes a little less central in one's own view of the world.

Experiencing these feelings can be exciting and is nearly always beneficial.


Have you read the trip entries which I've been belatedly adding about
our trip to NYC?

Home

The little jet pulled into YVR (Vancouver International Airport) at a bit after three AM. We decided not to wait for public transit to start and took a taxi to New Westminster. Everything was fine and a couple of hours of sleep was really needed. It's raining and we didn't see any of that in New York City during the past eight days.

Later in the day, after the chores get completed, I'll fill in a few of the missing days of my eJournal and images with text and lots of photographs of Manhattan.

Day of Rest

We will be heading home this evening. As our flight doesn't leave Newark until the evening, we won't bother to head over until 4:00 pm. Our 7-day transit cards ran out at midnight last night; therefore, we will just be taking it easy. Central Park is just across the street from the YMCA.

I promised myself not to wax too philosophical about it. Yet how forward-thinking to have created the whole middle of the island as common space! It's part of what makes Manhattan so ... New York. There seem to be places where you can forget you're surrounded by eight million people. In a city that's often raw with individualism, it's wonderful that in the mid-1800's an original 700 acres was set aside for public enjoyment.

We'll laze around after a noon checkout time and eventually take a shuttle van to EWR.

Close Up and Personal

Even though we got to the ticket booths quite early, we still weren't able to get admission into the statue's base. They just put up the 'full' sign as we were approaching the agent. It seems as though most people pre-register online for the few precious places. The day had started off grey, but as it was quickly clearing we knew that it'd be a fine day to venture out into the harbor anyway. Lady Liberty and nearby Ellis Island are both National Park lands. It was definitely worth it and hordes of other tourists appeared to think so too.

In the afternoon I had to find a couple of I-heart-NY t-shirts. We also dropped in to say goodbye to Piyatissa.

The Musical

One can't very well say they've done the Big Apple without taking in a show. At first I was worried that my only pants were the jeans I'd been wearing all week. It was a Sunday matinee show, though. I guess people seldom dress up for shows anymore with the exception of a few on Saturday night.

We went for the revival of La Cage aux Folles. Just how old is Robert Goulet?

Prior to the afternoon show, we spent the morning in Central Park. Today was the 20th Annual NYC Aids Walk. The news reported that nearly 45,000 people participated. Imagine, that's nearly the size of New Westminster, BC! It was a nice morning to watch the people and the event raised more than 5.8 million dollars.

Lots in a Compact Area

 

We started the day by going to the Trade Center Site. Informational signage has just been erected along some of the perimeter fences. The information is useful and inspiring. In the news, the design for the new tower looks great. Still, there's something missing as they're not planning a set. It just seems as though, even symbolically, there should be twin spires.

Next, we rode around on the subway for an hour. On the weekends there are some service changes; we kept ending up in Brooklyn! We were searching for Chinatown around lunchtime as we had previously found a nice, cheap place to eat there.

The second major event was walking the Brooklyn Bridge.  One hundred and twenty-two years ago, people paid a penny just for the same privilege. It's been free for the last 95 years though.

Lastly, we took the subway up to 96th Street and walked back through Central Park. What an amazing space in the center of the city!

Change of Address

We started the day at the deli on 3rd E46th. Later the train took us to Wall Street to look around. We had to return to the Vanderbilt YMCA to check out at 11:30. We did so and made our way back to Times Square and then took Line 1 to Columbus Circle. The West Side YMCA is here. We had to check our bags because the room wasn't ready until 2:30 pm. During the interim, we went to find Rockefeller Plaza. We'll never be able to get up in the morning early enough to stand out on the Plaza to participate in NBC's Today Show. We also cut through the southern corner of Central Park.

After a nap and an extra shower, we ventured out again. We stayed on the subway and peeked into the part of Harlem that surrounds the stations. Perhaps there is gentrification but it sure didn't look as prosperous as everywhere else. I'll have to write more when we return about my thoughts on New York City. It's grand simply because it's NOT homogeneous.

After 10:00 we went back to say hello to Jay's brother again. As his schedule is not compatible with ours, we won't have many chances to socialize. I am so tired, no wonder I sleep long hours ...

Greetings from Times Square!

"We're at an Internet shop in Times Square. There are about 1000 machines. Things are going fine. More when we get back ..."

(I wrote that message online but now I'm filling in more details of the day.)

The day started even later than yesterday. We went to South Terminal after breakfast, yet it was too late to catch tickets on the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. I should clarify: The tickets are always available but there are limits to the number of visitors that can actually ascend the base section. We were too late to be able to do that, so we decided to try the lady later in the week.

Still feeling in a touristy mood meant we went right to the Empire State building for a trip to the observation deck. Eighty-six stories sure beat the mere ten of the apartment in BC. Of course, we have lots of pictures of us in front of the view. 

 

 

Lots of walking also allowed us to see Hell's Kitchen and the East Village areas today. Boy, are my feet tired! I'm glad I got a good pair of running shoes before coming.

Swiping the Transit Card

Today, we didn't get up till 9:00 am. The rooms at the Vanderbilt YMCA are quiet and adequate. All have televisions, but they are incredibly small. Still, the Y is a bargain and in a convenient location and very near the 2-3-4 lines. From Vancouver, we were only able to reserve for two more nights here.

We ate breakfast at a deli. Good old New York delicatessens are as perfect for tourists as those workers who are on a dash to and from work.

We caught a train to Battery Park and took the Staten Island Ferry. As we have enough time to see NYC without rushing, we took a leisurely MTA above-ground train line that cuts south to the tip of the island. It was interesting to see how rural things can look an hour's commute from downtown Manhattan.

We went back to Times Square tonight. The 'crossroads of the world' seems to be busy whenever you happen there.

Settling In

Yesterday evening when we got to the Vancouver airport, we discovered that the America West plane to Vegas was about three hours late. This meant that we wouldn't have been able to make our connection to Newark. After one false try, we were finally booked on an Air Canada flight via Toronto. "Oh good," we thought, "they still serve meals!" We got into Newark about 40 minutes later than our original flight would have put us there.

We then hopped on a bus to Grand Central Station and walked to where we were staying. The transportation got us there too early to check into the Vanderbilt YMCA but we left the bags, ate in an Indian restaurant and walked a few blocks to the United Nations Building.



After a nap, bought one week, unlimited-travel MTA cards for the subway system. We walked to Grand Central and took the Shuttle to Times Square.

Eventually, we went to see Jay's brother who works nights. I'd not seen Piyatissa since visiting Sri Lanka in the 1980's. It's now after midnight. Yawn.

Let's Be Frank

I blog as regularly as clockwork, generally. However, it's time for a short vacation to New York City. We'll leave here late afternoon and connect to catch a red-eye from Las Vegas. We might find our way into an Internet cafe, but the full run down will not appear until after we return to New Westminster on May 18th.



Sometimes there is no better way
to express a feeling than by finding a
person who's already said it.

If We Can Make It There ...

I passed in the marks for my course on Monday of this week. This, in essence, means I am free for about five weeks. I will probably teach weekends throughout the summer.

So, I was looking on www.expedia.ca to see what we could do for a week or so. We settled on a vacation to NYC from May 9th to May 18th. America West has some reasonably priced fares although it means a change of planes in Nevada! Talk about weird: the per-ticket price to get just to Las Vegas is about $95 MORE than we are paying to go all the way through to Newark.

I haven't been in Manhattan since a trip during my college days. For reference, that may have occurred back when both New York City and I were broke. We're happy to be going to the city that doesn't sleep. This is primarily because we haven't booked any accommodation yet!