Seems the weather from Melbourne has finally caught up to me. It has been cold, windy, and wet all day today. As if I needed a reminder that I was going home! I was planning to go up at least one tall building before I went, but there didn't seem like a lot of point.

This morning I walked, in the rain, to Ess-a-Bagel on the corner of 1st Avenue and East 21st Street for the third and last time. This place was one of the major figures in the New York Bagel Wars of the 1970s. The first time I went there I made the faux-pas of asking to have my cinammon raisin bagel toasted. The man serving seemed quite indignant, saying, "We do not toast our bagels here, sir. They are fresh!" I never asked for it toasted there again. But tasting it, I realized they didn't need toasting. Definately among the best bagels I've eaten here, particularly if it is served hot and fresh from the oven!

That shrewd philosopher of religion Belinda Carlysle was correct when she asserted that heaven was a place on earth. It's a small coffee shop in Greenwich Village called "Joe the Art of Coffee", and this morning I went there to have my last good machiato before I depart for the colonies. They have been spot on every time!

I've been to see two shows in the past three days. On Friday I saw the Blue Man Group. It was a sort of performance art. Really funny though. It's been really popular. They have been performing at the Astor Place Theatre for the last 17 years.

Last night I went to the New York Theatre Workshop to see a play. NYTW is alleged to be the authentic New Yorker alternative to Broadway, and has won quite a few awards. Apprently this was where Rent was first performed (still haven't seen that one). The play was called Black Eyes, and was about four Arab women in limbo about to enter the "room of martyrs". Hard to describe exactly what it was about with such little time to think about how to articulate it in writing.

I have also spent the last few days frantically doing last minute shopping. On Saturday and Sunday, I mostly cruised the markets. And there are a lot of markets. There was a big one on Lexington Avenue, and a farmers market in Union Square, and one in Soho along Broadway and West Broadway. Lot's of artists on West Broadway selling their work on the streets. There was some really impressive (and expensive) stuff.

I think that's about it. This will be my last post. If anyone is still reading, I hope you have enjoyed my blog. I'm sad to leave New York, but in a way it will be good to get back home, back to my routine and my study. I also think my constitution has probably reached its capacity for solitude, as I have more or less explored New York alone. It's been a challenge, and it's been fun, but I look forward to catching up with my friends and family when I get back to Melbourne (after a good night's sleep, that is!!)

Signing off,
Dale Hutchinson

Hello everyone. I know it has been a while since I last posted.

I moved out of the hostel yesterday. I could only stay there a maximum of 26 nights, and so I checked into the Latham Hotel on East 28th Street in Flat Iron. My feelings are mixed about the placed. My first impression of the place was that it was quite a step up from the hostel. The lobby looked very nice, and I had a staff member carry my luggage up to my room on the 7th floor. I have a room to myself with a queen-size bed, which is pretty nice, a TV with cable access, a bar fridge, and my own telephone. I also have my own wash basin so I can brush my teeth and shave without having to leave my room. So that all seemed pretty nice in contrast to the six bed dorm I was sleeping in and the grotty bathrooms at the youth hostel.

But the downside is that there is only one toilet and shower for the whole floor, which means if you get a shower in the morning, or get to go to the toilet, it's by pure chance. A lot of the channels on the TV don't have a good picture and sound staticky (don't know if that is a word or not), and I can't seem to make external phone calls, despite following the instructions provided. The only internet access there is wifi available in the lobby, and I don't have my laptop with me. So there are a few issues that I didn't have at the hostel.

But anyway, a lot of news on the food front. There is a restaurant on Amsterdam Avenue called "Flor de Mayo", which was so good I went two nights in a row. I have never seen such an eclectic menu. It had Spanish, Chinese, and Peruvian all on the same menu. I tried some shredded chicken from the Peruvian menu the first night, and the second night I had sweet and sour shrimp. The service was also excellent and the meal (relatively!) inexpensive.

On Tuesday night I went to the Corner Bistro on Jane Street, West Village. Rumo(u)r has it that they make the best burgers in New York City. Apparently when the word got out, it turned into yuppyville. I was lucky to beat the rush. The burger was indeed delicious. Something about the beef patty. I wonder what was in it...

But burgers and pizzas aside, there are plenty of healthy food alternatives here in New York. Organic food seems to be in fashion here. There are no shortage of cafes here that sell fruit salad, non-fat yoghurt, and even choose-your-own salads (NB a "cafe" can mean one of two things. It often refers to a type of cafeteria-style venue, and when asked if you want it "to stay" or "to go", and you ask to have it "to stay", the only difference is that they put your meal on a tray!)

There is a combined health food restaurant and vitamin supplement place in Greenwich Village called "Eva's" which sell fat free and sugar free muffins, along with other healthy food and meals. I've been there twice now, and there seem to be a lot of body builders coming in all the time, some with arms so big they almost need to step through the door sideways to get in. There was some guy having an argument with the person at the register. I don't know what it was about; something about them not having some supplement he always gets there. Must have been the steroids talking or something.

But against my better judgement I have also been to Starbucks several times, not so much for the coffee, but because I can just sit there, read and write, and not be disturbed. When I was at the hostel it was difficult to find a place where there wasn't a lot of noise.

For coffee, I still haven't found a better place than "Joe the art of Coffee". I was there only moments ago, and not only did I have a machiato, but a delicious chai latte. They display a "Joe coffee fact of the day" on the counter; apparently between 1998 and 2003, the number of coffee houses rose by 80% (I don't know if that was just New York or America wide) - roughly 17,000. Yes, they are still catching up to Australia in the coffee stakes, but they are trying...

Last night I went to the Nuyorican Poetry Cafe on the Lower East Side to see a poetry slam. They had some musicians accompanying a lot of the performers, and there were some very talented hip-hop artists and rappers. The last performers were a group called "Enemies of the State". I don't know if they are famous, but the name sounded familiar. I don't know if that counts as a celebrity sighting or not, so I'll lump that in the "maybe" category.

Anyway, I'm hoping to go and have dinner in Chinatown in a few hours.

Over and out.

Major developments on the coffee front!! Today I had what was probably the best machiato ever. The place is called "Joe the Art of Coffee", located in Waverley Place in Greenwich Village. I saw on the counter nearby soon after I ordered a latte waiting for someone else, and I got really excited when I saw the golden brown froth decorated with a white leafy pattern. And when I tasted my machiato, sheer delight! The best I've had here by a long shot (boom tsch!) At last, I have discovered what must be the best coffee in New York, and probably the best machiato I have had in either hemisphere. Tomorrow I plan to go and have my morning tea there.

Well... I had my most expensive day in New York on Monday. In the evening I went to "Cafe des Artistes" on West 67th Street. Very plush, and very expensive. I was attracted to the name, and I was curious about whether expensive food tastes better than cheape food. I hope you all appreciate the great financial sacrifice I've made in order to share with you my experience of this restaurant, so that others after me will not have to bare the same financial burden...

Anyway, so the place was located in the "Hotel des Artistes", which has been operating since 1917. It was a small place. Fairly quiet. There weren't many people there, possibly because it was a Monday night. I ordered a glass of Merlot - some French brand, "Chateau de something something..." and some steak served with some mixture of wilted spinach and cheese, and... "pommes des frites". I should have realized what this was from my high school french. It's the posh way of saying "french fries". I'm still not used to the idea that chips are served with an expensive high-brow meal. Seems a bit out of place. The same thing happened when I had the duck confit at Cafe Mogador; it was served with a bowl of chips. Just seems odd. I guess the Americans really like their fries.

The main course was lovely, although I don't know if was particularly mindblowing, which I would expect for $39. The dessert, on the other hand, was much better value. It was recommended to me by one of the very friendly waiters (and who wouldn't be friendly when you're expecting a nice big tip, which is directly proportional to the cost of the food and drink). It was called "Hot Fudge 'Napoleon'", and consisted of two flat, oblong pieces of pastry sandwiching some icecream, with a blob of cream on top, garnished with strawberries and blueberries, and latticed with hot fudge. It would have to have been the best dessert I've ever had!

So after dinner, I headed to the Iridium Jazz Club in Midtown, where I saw Les Paul and his trio perform. He had a number of other performers come out, like a jazz violinist, a tap dancer, and a singer. Steve Miller was also in the audience (famous for some big band I think) and got up and performed. And... our very own Olivia Newton-John was also in the audience, and she got up and sung "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". So all in all, I had a very good night!!

Well, on Friday I decided I needed to go do the sort of thing you tourists come to do while they're in New York. I went to the Guggenheim. It was... interesting. Actually, the experience didn't excite me that much. If anything it was a little frustrating. I loved the inside of the building (I couldn't see the outside of it because it was surrounded by scaffolding for its refurbishment). But the artwork... well, they were very pretty, but I'm not at all well schooled in art, and a lot of them quite frankly looked the same as each other. I didn't really know what distinguished one Matisse from the other. And then there was the blue fibreglass plank on display. Is this suppose to challenge our conceptions of art? I just felt looking at these works was like trying to understand a conversation in a foreign language I didn't know. Like I said, some of them looked very nice, but you don't put works on display in a gallery just because they look nice. Quite frankly, there was at least one Picasso there which looked like it could have been done by a child in kindergarten. I couldn't say whether these works were good or bad, because I just didn't know (Rodney, perhaps you could help me out here).

Oh well, on a more pleasant note, that night I went to a FREE concert at NYU put on by the music faculty. They played Dvorak's Dumky Trio and a Brahms String Sextet in B flat. There's another free concert in a few days being performed by the Boromeo String Quartet which is conducting a workshop at the university, so I may go along to that as well.

Today I plan to go to a flea market in Hell's Kitchen, and a market in Chelsea. Then at 4PM I believe there is a poetry reading at the Bowery Poetry Club. So that's my plan for today, although things don't usually go to plan.

I've uploaded some photos onto photo bucket. You can access them here . Username is dhutch81, password dallas81. Then click on the sub album titled "New York Escapade". Haven't posted all of them up yet, but will try to put more there when I have the time.

Take care everyone,
Dale

I still hold out hope that I will find good coffee, other than just espresso. A little bit of research on the internet revealed that there was a small cafe in Greenwich Village which served "stick-brewed" coffee (apparently some unique brewing method invented by the owner). So on Tuesday, I went and found the place, and had a small (ie a mug) coffee. It wasn't bad as far as Americano coffee goes. I guess it's hard to compare American coffee to the fancy espresso I usually have.

I saw the rock musical "Spring Awakening" that night. Very enjoyable. It was about a group of adolescents in a German provincial town in the 1890s trying to learn about sex and questioning their parents and teachers, only their parents and teachers wouldn't give them the information they wanted and discouraged them from thinking for themselves. So they find out things for themselves, which eventually leads tragedy.

Yesterday was 4th of July - Independence day. Most of the day just seemed like another weekend. Lots of people out in Central Park. It was overcast, and possibly the coolest day since I had arrived. Rain looked inevitable. I was expecting to see lots of people getting dressed up and decorations everywhere like the ones the politicians use at their election rallies. Didn't see it. The Upper West Side was pretty quiet really. Most shops were closed. There were a few people on the street. Midtown was full of tourists as usual. So not thinking that there was anything special going on, I went out on my own as usual. Went shopping in Midtown, and ate at a Turkish restaurant on 47th Street. However, as I made my way back, there were a lot of loud banging noises, and rumbles in the distance, and the sound of fireworks exploding. It was hard to see with all the buildings in the way. I saw a couple. When I got to the hostel, however, the TV in the lobby was showing all the fireworks live. Looks like I missed it. Still, I comforted myself knowing that it was raining and everyone who was out there watching the fireworks were getting drenched. Hmph.