Bye Bye NYC, Hello DC.

Thursday evening I went to Puffy’s for the final time with Deepa, Michele, Rory, Christopher, Addie and Josh. Tim joined as well, just as Rory was getting the pitchers of Radeberger in. After a few pints I contacted the police to check up on how the investigation was going and they said to come up to the precinct on 151st to go through the details again. So myself and Tim went up north to the precinct, walking through Harlem in my business casual clothes and Tim with his camera strapped round him we looked ready for mugging. At the police station we met Detective Davis and sat down at his desk in a large room with a cell in the corner housing a guy in jail at the time we were there. After printing a few things off (including images off facebook – how up to date are the police!) and going through the details once more we left the station and headed to meet Deepa and Michele who were sat inside a Thai restaurant on amsterdam avenue called Four Seasons.

We overstayed our welcome a little bit, by which I mean the owners said they were going to go home and just to let the one remaining worker know when we left, plus a man came in and parked his motorbike in front of the bathroom and fridge containing the beer. On leaving we saw them piling into two cars outside for their journey to Flushing. Great chicken pad thai and spring rolls though. From here we headed back to Caroline’s to sleep.

So the last day of work started early the next day so that we could finish in time to go for lunch as a big group. We finished at around half 11 and took some brow-tie photos courtesy of Craig’s collection. From work we walked to Gigino’s, a really lovely italien restaurant set back slightly from the promenade at the southern tip looking out at Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. The food was incredible, I had a great escotica salad (check their website http://www.gigino-wagnerpark.com/ to check what was in it – like you care?) for starter, for main i had pollo alla valdostana which was top notch and a fantastic raspberry cheesecake for dessert. After taking some great photos facing the statue of liberty in great sunshine I headed back to Caroline’s to pack up. It was really sad to say goodbye to all the Locus people, knowing that it is unlikely we will ever all be together again at any one time. They were all such brilliantly fun and friendly people and I am definitely gonna try and keep in touch with them.

I packed up my stuff and was about to head to Craig’s to leave my stuff while I went on my journey to DC and Boston when it started pouring with rain. So I sat in Caroline’s kitchen drinking red wine with her, her dad and her friend Gabriel who was visiting. After a while I really had to leave and drop my things of before meeting up with Izzy and Tim at Amy’s place on Christopher St. After getting absolutely soaked and a little lost I arrived at Craig’s where his housemate Chaz was on hand to let me in and give me a towel to dry myself down before heading back into the rain. I got to Amy’s place and had some wine with Tim and Izzy who then went and got some falafel for their dinner, after which we went and met some of the Locus lot for karaoke, which had a byob policy, awesome. We stayed there for 2 hours, singing our hearts out, Tim even nearly sang, but just when he was about to muster up the courage our time ended. It was a fantastic night and a great way to end it all, getting smashed and having a lot of fun. To any locus person reading this, you are all welcome to come stay with me any time you come to the UK, just get in contact.

Saturday was a beautiful day, unfortunately due to trains we didnt have time to go up to Smorgasburg (an awesome food market in Williamsburg) so me and Tim wandered to Prospect Park and walked about in the sunshine, such a peaceful place, designed by the same person who designed Central Park. For lunch we had Macdonalds, classy i know, where there was a really cute 5 yr old boy who was being tricked by his dad that he had lost his bag, the dad then said “i could never be in angry with you” when the son asked if the dad was angry with him. We quickly rushed back to Caroline’s where we were greeted by a tearful Deepa (not because we were leaving but because she had been reading Kite Runner). Fortunately we got to the bus in time and were waved off by Adam, very kind of him to do so.

Weird to say but I had such a good bus journey, with Boltbus – very comfy seats, free wifi and good aircon, plus i managed to write lots of me blog. We were met at dupont circle by Annie and Chris Keally, Tim’s friends from Jordan where he learned Arabic the previous summer. From here we headed straight to Bier Baron for burger and chips, and the obligatory beer – classic me. After a quick drop off of stuff at Annie’s lovely place located near all the embassies (the British one was huge and with heavy security) we went to Chris’ cousin’s place just up from Adam’s Morgan. Here there was a roof top party (I feel its my standard entry into a new state now) with a gin bucket (a water cooler filled with gin, sugar and lemonade). I didn’t really speak to anyone else but the people we had come with, the others at the party were classic American girls (by classic I mean the type youd see in the OC or 90210), who all seemed very fake, it was fun though – mainly due to the free alcohol. From here we walked down in to Adam’s Morgan and went to Reef Bar, where Chris was on the prowl and I bought us a vodka red bull, very expensive. We wandered further down after realising Chris was having no luck to Town Tavern for another drink and bit of a dance before a jumbo pizza slice for some and homeward bound via taxi.

2* Hostel, Decontamination and a bbq at Craig’s

On Tuesday I went to the art store with Caroline to pick up supplies from Pearl Paint on Canal St to make a straw dog for Rory. Once back at Caroline’s house I packed up all my things into my large suitcase and packed a rucksack that I intended to use for the rest of working at Locus and my following trips to DC and Boston. It was absolutely rammed and had to include my laptop also. I had a quick bite of some pork stew before getting the train to Penn Station to meet Tim – I found him looking a bit lost by Madison Square Garden. It was great to see him, too long time no see. We wandered down to a Starbucks to use the loo and to figure out where the hostel Tim had booked us was located.

When we arrived at Sun Hotel in Chinatown we didn’t have high hopes given the awful reviews on hostelbooker.com, where the only thing above 2 stars was the good location, cleanliness, friendliness of staff, value for money were all 2 stars. As we were checking in at what appeared to be a passport border control booth, this boy, who we later found out his name was Paul came down from upstairs and looked utterly traumatised. To make matters worth he said “have you seen upstairs?… no…[shakes the head in dismay, looks at us with pity of our hopeful faces] it’s awful”, oh dear, oh very dear. The walk up to the 5^th floor sapped any hope from us, it smelt of a mix of piss and cigarettes, the “rooms” were in fact little booths max 2 x 3 m big with no roofs but had chicken wire above them to prevent people climbing in. It was, essentially, awful. The only bonus about the floor we were on was that it had been newly painted and was much cleaner than the other floors. There were 64 “rooms” packed into a room about the size of a tennis court, maybe smaller. The “walls” were incredibly thin you could hear everything that everyone was doing. It was so bad I started to find it funny, fortunately, given Paul’s comments we had changed our booking from 4 nights to 1 night with the hope that I could organise something else for tomorrow.

We dumped our bags in our rooms and rushed out to a really lovely bar down the road. To be honest it could have been a shack as long as it had beer I would have thought it was lovely. Tim had these crostini things while I looked at his photos from South America and drank me beer. Afterwards we begrudgingly went back to the less than sunny Sun Hotel where we crashed out, hoping to wake up somewhere else.

After work on Wednesday I met Tim and printed some stuff off from the office for the film that Diana had written the script for. It was the rewriting of Genesis to account for the growth of the Locus system, I was to play the BBC News Correspondent Narrative role. From here we set off to Caroline’s, who had agreed to house both of us, so so generous. However, there was a caveat due to us having stayed in the grim hostel the night before, we had to wash all our clothes and keep our bags in a plastic bag downstairs. When we arrived Caroline took us downstairs and into the garden where we had to strip down with only a towel for decency, before taking a shower. I felt like a small child that had shat himself at school and was publicly humiliated by having to be hosed down in front of everybody.

The film was stopped early due to various reasons, the main one being that we were already running late for getting to Craig’s for a bbq. After a trip via Trader Joes to get some food supplies we got to Craig’s, where Adam had been waiting with Craig, girlfriend Amelia and room mate Tyler for half an hour or so. It was an awesome apartment, the rooms were huge and really nicely decorated and it had a rooftop area. Music was playing on the rooftop and the bbq was going. Once myself and Tim had had a burger we went on a beer run, however got horrendously lost due to not understanding what Craig had meant when saying some word in Spanish that means corner shop but I had thought meant the name of the store. So we returned beer-less, however Michele had gone out and got beer instead. It was a really nice evening, one of the highlights being the playing of Tyler’s song promoting his Mexican takeaway – Dos Toros, the best Burrito I have had so far. The name of the song is Guac It Out, check it out on youtube soon.

Leaving Harlem and PS1 MOMA

On Saturday I left my apartment with all my things and headed to Caroline’s in Brooklyn for the rest of my stay in New York. It was absolutely baking on the subway, I felt like I was having a constant shower, lovely jubbly. When I got to Caroline’s it was pouring with rain and I was shattered from lugging my stuff up and down the stairs of the subway system, the most exercise I have done in too long. I was greeted by another stray, Deepa, who had been kicked out of her place the week before. Caroline and her lovely family were out celebrating Alan’s (Caroline’s dad) birthday. Deepa and I waited inside for the rain to subside before heading out for a wander around the local area. We got a burrito each from a seemingly chinese restaurant, it was cheap and filling so I didn’t ask any questions. We bought Alan a blueberry and lemon tart from this great bakery place nearby.

In the evening Deepa stayed at Caroline’s for the dinner party to celebrate Alan’s birthday, the guy who broke the news about Strauss-Kahn was attending, but I had already said that I’d meet with the boys from Locus for a few drinks. Where else to go but crocodile lounge, obviously. Myself, Ze’ev, Alex and Michele, followed later by Winston had some beers with free pizza outside and then headed in to play skee ball. It’s a very entertaining game but I had no idea what to do at first and got a terrifically bad score. Myself and Ze’ev played a shooting game while the others competed, along with this random guy who seemed to be there solely to play games, finished the rest of the skee ball competition.

Outside we met up with Adam and Silas, who had not managed to evade the bouncer this time, Geoff and Jess. Alex left us to go and meet up with his cousin while the rest of us went back to Winston’s place for some Four Loco and beers. Four Loco used to be a combination of beer and a lot of caffeine but it was made illegal and now its just shit, really shit malt beer. Eventually we left to hit up this Bulgarian place that Winston’s friends were at. Unfortunately they were incredibly strict on the door with ID and so we left Winston to have a good night in there and we went for drinks nearby at Peri Wine bar where myself and Michele got a pitcher of Sangria. Afterwards the others bailed and Michele and I went for another beer next door where we managed to stand in every inconvenient position with regards to the entrance to the restroom. To top the manic day off it poured with rain on the way back home, where Deepa had to let me in.

The following day I got up around midday after responding to emails and checking the football scores from the day before. The rain was still going when Caroline’s family, plus me Deepa and Henry’s girlfriend Amy went to PS1 MOMA in Brooklyn. The art was the most random that I have ever seen, I had literally no idea what a few of them were trying to get at. Laura Nakadate made herself cry every day for 365 days and took pictures of herself before during and after each time, on top of this she had filmed herself in Tokyo Love Motels in just panties pretending to have sex with an invisible man. Francis Alys also had some work here, one of which was filming the 81 Buckingham Palace guards finding each other on a walk around London. This other artist had done a series of 5+ films that were about consumerism and had dressed up in drag, spoken in an incredibly irritating squeal and appeared to be speaking absolute bollocks. Interestingly we saw Laura Nakadate wondering about outside and I ran after her to find out how she had made herself cry every day but had lost her through the museum.

Afterwards we all went to Brooklyn Heights, known to Deepa has Little India, she was so excited to see lots of Indians and commented that “I might go to India after the internship now”, instead of heading home to California for the rest of summer. We had an amazing curry and were joined by Alex for it, the food was really great. From here myself Deepa and Alex went into Manhattan on the number 7 passing some incredible graffiti on the way, one was this huge painting of Biggie – looked very lifelike. We got some sweets/candy, SourPatch to be exact, before watching Horrible Bosses with Adam, Silas and Adam B. Funny film but they had shown most of the funny stuff in the trailer for it. Adam B won $5 off me for betting that one of the characters would have sex with Jennifer Anniston’s character, the fucker. After the movie he then got in argument with a guy handing out leaflets for a comedy night, since he was blocking Adam B’s way and didn’t move on asking, funny end to a great day.

And so the last week at Locus Analytics started, I have thoroughly enjoyed working here. The other interns, the mangers and the incredibly generous Rory (the owner) have really made it – everyone is friendly (some more so than others), everyone is interesting and intelligent. The work itself was very interesting and the office was proper plush, every job from here is going to be downhill. To start the celebrations Rory took half of us interns, along with Josh, Towson and Addie to Trattoria Cinque in the evening for a meal, which ended up to lasting over 4 hours.

We were sat in a large room in the back around a large square table with a lazy susan in the middle, which appeared to require grabbers to reach any of the food. For starter we got goats cheese and pear pizza, caspaccio beef, calamari and various other dishes. All washed down with some great white wine. For main I had the largest steak I have ever been presented, it was chargrilled and very tasty, I lost man points though since I didn’t finish it all. It got to that point where people were waiting for me to finish, furthemore it had gone slightly cold, so I felt awkward and decided to stop eating. To finish the meal off I had an awesome cheesecake just after we had had a long discussion about the project and the meaning of semantics.

From here I went uptown to Jimmy’s Corner where I had a drink with Tyler, my old room mate, and his friend from work. It was great to see him and his friend was lovely too. A great way to finish off the day.

Front row yankees and Pacha with drunken fullers

On thursday we clocked off work at half 11 in the morning and wandered in the heat to the subway by Brooklyn Bridge where we took the train up to the Yankees stadium in the Bronx, where Rory had bought us all tickets to the game and later gave us $20 each to spend on food and drink, such a generous man. Before we got into the stadium I had donned Craig’s Yankees baseball cap, Ze’ev and Alex (both Boston Red Sox fans, and hence haters of the Yankees) promptly attempted to take the cap off me. I was trying to dodge them and ended up tripping over a man’s foot and falling head first into his legs, he looked less than impressed virging on wanting to kill me. Anyway, I felt like a right numpty but it did stop Ze’ev and Alex trying to take the cap off me, every cloud and all that. The seats were brilliant, we were sat on the second tier in the burning hot sun, jeans were definitely a mistake on my part. To cool myself down I went a bought a pint of beer – $12, rip off but what the hell, when in Rome. For lunch I got a torrisi meatball sandwich, it was lush.

Rory also has 4 seats on the very front row, just to the right of the dugout as you look at it, and took a few of the interns down there at a time to watch an innings from the awesome seats. I was lucky enough to go down there with Ze’ev, to get there we had to walk through a very fancy suite area where there was a plethora of awesome food on show, a bar at the front and screens showing the game going on outside – felt like we were probably surrounded by extraordinarily rich and influential people. The seats Rory owns are next to those owned by former Mayor of New York, Rudi Giuliani. Rory bought us a beer to share  and we wandered to the seats outside. They were fantastic, such a good view – obviously, we saw a great inning, within which a Robinson Cano scored a grand slam hitting a home run towards right field with 3 men on base. The crowd went mental and it was high-fives all around with Rory. The Yankees ended up winning 6-5 after a late show from the Angels, great game, great fun.

After the game we took a walk around the stadium for photo opportunities and just to waste some time before we went for dinner. After a train ride and a walk through the Bronx, standing out as tourists like the japanese tourists in cambridge. For dinner we sat outside at this Italien restaurant and were treated to champagne and seemingly endless courses to fill us up. For starter, which Ty thought was all we were getting and hence ate loads, we had clams, fried zuchini, calamari, fried  tiny octopus and a few prawns here and there accompanied by a nice tomato/salsa-esque dip. The next course saw various pasta dishes served, by this time everyone was thinking this was the main but then we had to order our main on top of that. I got chicken parmesan for main which was really great, all washed down with some great white wine. Afterwards I had some tea, which was fairly awful, while telling some jokes (provided by Anthony Williams), Ze’ev then proceeded to tell some tasteless jokes that I loved.

We all got the train back into Manhattan and several of us got off at 125th on the east side, myself Adam B and Ze’ev got a taxi across town from this dick of a taxi driver, who seemed upset he a. had to drive us places b. had to have people in his cab – seems like he should give up his day job. Ze’ev went off to a friend’s birthday party, while myself, Adam B and Alex went for a drink at Brother Jimmy’s following an unsuccessful attempt at getting in the Gin Mill with Adam B’s fake Rhode Island driving licence. We had a pitcher of Coors, which I polished off since the other two were distracted by tiredness or the need to shit out half their body weight (Adam B).

On Friday I went to Puffy’s with Deepa, Michele and Winston for a pair of beers of Radeberger before heading home for some delicious sausage and mash. I met up with Alex and extremely drunk Adam and brother Silas on Amsterdam and 80th, they were smashed. To get on it we went to Bourbon St bar where Ze’ev met us, Silas managed to walk in via the front of the bar that had been opened up, once again avoiding the bouncer’s ID check. I got a pitcher with Alex and quickly finished it so Adam, Silas and I could head off to Pacha, a club with multiple floors and allows 19+ in. We had signed up to the guestlist, unfortunately so had the world and his mother. I got a blue wristband, which meant I got free entry, and had to give no proof of being on said guestlist – the others didnt and had to pay $20 cover charge, so beers were on me $10 each – the fuckers.

Pacha itself was pretty awful, the speakers were awful and it was made worse by the DJ attempting to play a truck siren/horn in time with the beat of the songs – so so shit. Silas was on a sharking mission and had us following him through the rammed dancefloor looking for talent. On podiums were dancing girls wearing leather catsuits and above them were more dancing girls. Before they had started dancing drunk girls and this American bro had been dancing on them thinking they were gods gift to the world – they weren’t they looked like morons. Silas got lucky with two leopard print wearing Spanish girls, who both vied for his attention. I felt like an old man, I hated the music, i didnt like being bumped into people the whole time and I didn’t want to have to shout to have a conversation – oh dear. After an hour of enduring the club we left, passing a bikini clad girl dancing in a shower upstairs, mental!

Airplane, Super Troopers and Comedy.

Charlie left early Monday morning, it had been awesome to see him and was a shame he couldn’t stay longer. In the evening I met up with Adam and brother Silas, who arrived Monday afternoon, at Bryant Park for the weekly free film. This time it was the film, Airplane, a comedy appropriately set on a plane, it was brilliant. Silas is Adam’s younger brother who goes to Cardiff uni doing medicine, and appears to consider himself a bit of a lad, so the fact that he was now under the drinking age in America was quite funny. He did however manage to evade the bouncer at Rudy’s, a bar just off Times Square, and walked straight into the place without having to show ID. This is the place where you get unlimited hot dogs when you buy a drink. We got a series of pitchers of Rudy’s Blonde and sat at the bar, chatting and listening to the awesome juke box playing throughout the bar.

Tuesday was a bit of a nothing day. At lunch I went with Craig to Locanda Verde, which inside looks like an old fashioned classy pub, twas great. We headed straight to the cookies and baked goods counter and spoke to Scarlett who works there. Craig busted out his best flirting and I followed lead, asking her about her life etc, which got us free sour cherry lemonade to accompany our buys – I got an oatmeal cookie sandwich thing, which was great. After work myself and Alex had a good chat with Craig about work and our career paths. Once I got home I finished watching Super Troopers that we had watched a bit of at lunch, it’s a great comedy involving prankster Highway cops, with a great “Car Ramrod” scene, when the loser Rod Farva is trying to create a team name with the other buddy – you probably have to see it… I had a nice chat with tyler and relaxed before heading bedwards.

The following day Adam, Silas and I attempted to go to Amateur Night at the Apollo Theatre in Harlem. I arrived there and entered a queue for any spare tickets for the evening. Adam and Silas didnt arrive for another half an hour or so and by then there were no tickets left, however an usher/security guy, said quietly to me that he could get us in in 10 minutes for $10 each, so we waited around trying not to look nonchalant, probably failing miserably. We gave up after a while, when a nice Dutch couple, who I had thought were pushing in front of us told us that it would be another half an hour before the guy could get us in. We went southwards to Eastville Comedy Club with the lovely-named KGB bar above it, Ze’ev was within sat with two buddies of his. It was a long thin room with a small stage for the performers, two more of Ze’evs friends performed – Rami and Bobby – one of whom was better than the other but I couldn’t possibly divulge which was which. Some of the comedy was great but some was awful, one guy barely got a laugh, realised it and then looked awkward for the rest of his turn, this same guy was asking people where they were from and asked Silas, who said England. Now this is the point that every American normally responds with a witty remark about the American revolution, running along a theme of “we won”, “you must be so upset”, “we’re better than you”, etc or how small the UK is. Silas had presented this guy jokes on a platter, but he just responded “oh, ok” and moved on – what a retard.

Afterwards we went to the bar across the street with various friends and friends of friends of Ze’ev, some of whom decided that Bobby and I were twins separated at birth. After a swift pint, Silas and Adam ventured home, while Ze’ev, Rebecca and Bobby went to get some food. We ended up sitting down for some burger and chips at this diner, after which we all headed on the 1 back uptown to bed.

Best weekend so far! Racing Quadracycles and Friendly Fires for Free

Felt grim saturday morning and sauntered on down to 113th st on broadway to “Le Monde” restaurant for some french toast with raspberry maple syrup and strawberries, it was awesome. Since we were in the area we wondered around Columbia campus and sat down in one of the many grassy areas outside the classic american university style buildings. This woman walks over to us and says (in a thick new york accent) “hey strangers, can one of you take a picture of our whole family”, so myself and Charlie take photos of them and meanwhile are spoken at by the father, who spoke  at 100 miles an hour, asking us whether he’d chosen right in picking a hotel in knightsbridge rather than mayfair, we said that we thought he should be fine! He then recommended a restaurant, Pisticci’s to us on the UWS (upper west side) close to where I live.

We made our way down to the Governor’s Island ferry terminal at the southern tip of Manhattan and waited for Alex, Adam and Pippa to join. We were a bit early/they were late and so we wandered through Battery Park getting an ice cream on route. While looking at the Navy war memorial this woman ran past us pushing a wheelchair with her old mother sat on, she seemed to be racing towards the set of steps leading to the promenade – very bizarre and eventually turned at the last minute to pose for a photo. By the time we got back to the ferry terminal Alex had already got on and the ferry had set sail for Governor’s Island, he had hedged his bets that we were on the ferry. Silly Alex. We met with Adam and Pippa for the next one and met up with Alex half an hour later.

On the island that day was a mega yoga festival, there were literally hundreds, maybe even over a thousand people all doing yoga. At one point they were all sat cross legged with a hand on the person next to them and proceeded to hum at the same tone as each other for minutes on end. It was like a day long yoga sesh, quite surreal. We decided upon a quadracycle, which is like a golf buggy in size but with 4 people pedalling rather than it being motorised. We managed to skip the line a little bit by one of us queueing to book the thing and one of us (me) pretending that we had already booked it – this fat chinese boy was not too happy with us. We set off with Alex driving and Charlie the front seat passenger with a totally non-functional steering wheel. After racing and defeating several other quadracycles, including fat boy, we went a bit off road, starting with some grinding and venturing onto the pavement – crazy times.

Following this we made our way to a cobbled courtyard and at each corner were cobbled slopes leading up to a grassy embankment. We cycled up to the top and raced down the slope gaining some serious speed. From here we moved onto the next corner and noticed another group following us in a quadracycle. They challenged us to some races once we had both raced down the slope; they were to go right and us left at the bottom since the roads were very narrow. We went first and went left, they followed at crazy speed and veered left just at the point when a group of ladies in a golf buggy were passing ourselves – they were terrified, we had to mount a curb and im pretty sure i saw their quadracycle go onto two wheels. They were promptly told by a park ranger to go and race elsewhere, and thats what we did. After a series of races, including a flat out race, a hill race and a final push start styley drag race we ended up 2-1 losers.

We met up after for a quick beer before we all headed back to Manhattan to carry on the post-race drinking. The pub we went to, Fraunces Tavern, is where George Washington gave his farewell adress to the officers of the Continental Army. It had a large collection of beer bottles locked up in glass fronted wooden cabinets, the whole place was quite dark with dark wood everywhere – felt a bit like the Black Boy from Winchester. We had a few Ommegang beers here with our defeaters; Desmond (a laid back guy from the Bay area in California), Beatrice, Nick, Laura and another guy, and then decided upon a chinese restaurant to go to. On walking to this restaurant Nick stops by a black limo and suggests we get in, we do and I crack open the whiskey from the glass decanter – thats an extra $30 says the driver – oops. We drive 10 blocks maximum to what looks like an average chinese restaurant, definitely not flashy or limo worth. Nick pays the $100, really generous of him and we sit down for a meal at this chinese place, the food was awesome, sesame chicken my personal favourite.

From the chinese place we headed over to trendy brooklyn to Krystyna’s and Margaret’s (K&M) bar, with its art deco tin walls and honeycomb tiled floor, within was cheap alcohol and three fantastically shit white rappers – truly god awful. Eventually they finished and a dj came on who played top 40 music not really in keeping with the trendy hipster setting. Our new friends were having a great time and it was great to chat to them and have a dance. Charlie & Pippa were distracted by other things…until Pippa ordered a half pint of wine and had two huge shots and promptly vomited outside – ending Pippa’s and Adam’s evening. Charlie and I followed our new friends to another bar further into Brooklyn across a sports field where we settled upon a Guinness each, which by then was completely unnecessary, after we had finished this we started the long journey back to my place, leaving our new buddies behind.

Woke up feeling pretty awful and walked down to the community food & juice restaurant by columbia, had an awesome breakfast of canadian bacon, poached eggs, carrot hash brown and some random “biscuit” thing with orange juice, great hangover cure. With hangover being cured we went to the high line, an old railway line above the streets that has been converted into a park, which once again was great to walk along. In the baking hot sun we headed back uptown to central park to the summer stage, where there was no queue – win.

We met up with Mealy plus several of her Goldman Sachs friends, who were all really friendly. Mealy was equipped with a water gun she’d been given and everyone around had beach balls that had been given out for free. The first band up were Cults, a New York based indie band, who all had the same haircut, girls and boys – long brown hair, the female lead singer was great and got really into it. It was a fantastically hot day so it was sweat central, so much so that mealy and nick had brought towels from their hotel to deal with it, which we all proceeded to share, nice.

Next up were Naked and Famous, a New Zealand indie band who have a couple of really good songs, the others were a bit meh but everyone was up and dancing about and the sun had gone in a bit, thank god – all in all really fun group though. Then came the showpiece, the reason that I had wanted to come to the concert anyway, Friendly Fires. The stage was transformed with a huge Friendly Fires banner put up at the back of the stage and a whole separate percussion kit was wheeled out onto the stage.

We mustled our way to the front, thanks in part to Mealy’s persistance, and with beer in hand we were set. They were fantastic, it is the most I have ever enjoyed a performance, I bet this is what George Duckworth feels like when he sees Horse Meat Disco or Jamie Jones. The lead singer danced in a similar style to Mick Jagger and was incredibly energetic, a few times he jumped down into the crowd and ran about with the microphone, which had an incredibly long lead. The bouncers looked a bit irritated each time he did this, since it meant that they had to be more alert. Each member of the band was going for it and were drenched in sweat by the end. It was awesome, made better by the fact that Charlie and Mealy were there too. I was so happy and the encore of Paris and Hawaiian Air was a great way to finish it, I had a fixed smile for the rest of the day.

Afterwards Nick went and fished out beers that he had hidden in a bush outside of the concert area in central park, and we found a spot at the top of a rocky hill to hide from the po po to drink them. Afterwards we walked to Strawberry Fields playing a bit of football on the road, it is the memorial for John Lennon, close to the place where he was shot. There was an old hippy guy playing music from a ghetto blaster, with a faithful dog and candles lit. In the evening Charlie and I eventually found Pisticci’s on the upper west side, recommended to us by the family in Columbia University the day before. It is the lovely Italien place, which was apparently the first NY restaurant to go completely carbon neutral. We had garlic bread with goats cheese on top to start, pretty great and then Maltagliati with ricotta, spinach and lamb – absolutely brilliant, topped up with some quality ice cold water.

Metropolis in Brooklyn and the Arrival of Charlie.

Wednesday was a bit of a nothing day apart from having some Tex Mex with a friend, the restaurant was (if you havent guessed) a mix of Texan and Mexican food – I had Beef in a Bun with fries and coleslaw, to be honest it all tasted a bit gash and I didn’t eat much of it.

The following day myself, Caroline, Lucy, Ze’ev and Diana went over to Brooklyn to watch the 1927 silent film Metropolis in Park Slope, as part of Celebrate Brooklyn. Beforehand we thought we were going to just drop off our bags in Caroline’s house but we walked downstairs to the kitchen and her mum had made dinner for us all. There were tomatoes with mozarella, olives (which I’m still trying to convince myself I like), bread, cheese, and once again Marmite – I made everyone try it, and most liked it, strange. Lisa (caroline’s mum) told me I could keep the Marmite, I’m not sure I have ever been happier. Dinner itself was some lovely pasta with spinach, accompanied by a few beers. After trying some green tea ice cream we headed to the park along with Diana’s friends who met us at Caroline’s house.

We got a spot just behind the seating area on the grass and laid down our mat, while passing around a kanteen full of beer. The Alloy Orchestra had created an original score for the film and were there performing it live while Metropolis went on behind them. It was fantastic, the music was great the film was incredibly entertaining and apparently the film’s budget was $5m, crazy times. I really really enjoyed it but afterwards was in a bit of a rush since Charlie O’Neill, one of my best friends from home who I’ve known since I was 5, was due to be arriving at my flat any minute. After collecting some beers on the way home and chatting to Tyler for a bit Charlie arrived in perfect timing, it was great to see him and we sat chatting over a beer before he went to sleep – given that he had been up for 23 hours who could blame him.

On Friday I waited outside work with Craig, Amy and Deepa for Charlie to arrive, the plan was to head to the Met to see the Alexander McQueen exhibit since I had borrowed a membership card off Towson to skip ahead of the 3 to 4 hour queue. Charlie arrived about half an hour after saying he would be 5 minutes looking like a broken man. He had fallen asleep in central park and then had managed to take the wrong train multiple times before giving up taking a taxi and the man not knowing where he wanted to go so got in the back with him to look at the interactive map before dropping him 5 blocks away from my work. A bonus though of this lateness was that Caroline had texted me saying that the membership card wasnt even getting you ahead of the queue so we went to Puffy’s to get a Radeberger and from here we decided upon Dean’s pizza restaurant on Greenwich st. We got a bottle of Chardonnay and a large pizza (which here they call a pie for some unknown reason – its definitely not a pie) with pepperoni and peppers, was great food.

From here we went to Diana’s place on the upper east side to drink some beers, Alex, Deepa, Adam plus friend Pippa joined us and we sat watching youtube videos and drinking beer. We then went to check out this bar that Diana had wanted to go to which was close to her house. On entering, the barmen were just completing a plastic cup tower that they were very proud of, unfortunately for them it fell over which meant that they had to serve us. It was a pretty random bar, very very small and they served beer and cheese as their speciality. We got some really strong dark ale, which tasted pretty good before calling it for the night. Charlie gave Pippa his train card in an act of chivalry but then realised he had to get on the bus across town so in fact shouldnt have given it away. Silly Charlie.

Met, “The Eiffel Tower” and Beer Pong

On Sunday I saw in central park in the morning in the baking hot sun catching some rays before meeting mealy and adam outside the Met where Mealy got us in for free with her corporate card, win. In the park were these students reading out a play, at first I thought they were having a really random and pretty open conversation with each other and then realised they were all reading different parts from a play. Anyway the met was awesome, soo many different artefacts, we headed straight for the armour room, where everything looked as heavy as a car to wear and there were some amazing guns and swords on display. The Italien armour funnily enough seemed more intent on looking fashionable than being effective protective wear – classic.

We met Mealy’s friend, Nick on the rooftop exhibition, where the view of central park was more inspiring than the art there by Anthony Caro, these random large metal constructions – the only interesting part about them was that you wondered how they even got to the roof. Nick got roped into taking 3 separate photos for different people while the rest of us ate red velvet pancakes, he was obviously giving off the air of a chief photographer. To escape this without further asks for photos we went downstairs to look through the rest of the museum, including work by Pollock and Liechtenstein, as well as this painting by Chuck Close titled “Frank” that looks exactly like a photograph. Mealy left to go and skype her parents and the remaining three of us headed through musical instruments before walking to central park via getting an ice lolly.

We sat in central park watching a basketball game that was fairly well attended and had a great commentator on a megaphone between two 2nd grade teams, which really surprisingly means between 7-8 years old, which makes no sense at all given that they looked at least 12. Anyway the best part of the whole thing was the commentator who never stopped talking, he kept on calling this tall boy the “Eiffel Tower” who was apparently the “best second grader in the whole country” in a thick Harlem accent and another “Brian the Body”, both collossal players on the better team “11th best in the US of A”, while also telling us that he was “gonna get himself one of those mohicans”, since most of the players had them. The 11th best team won convincingly and the tiny boy called Tyrese was probably one of the best really.

It was awesome weather and walked around central park to Belvedere Castle and down by the lake through the woodland to where people were on little rowing boats on the water. We stumbled across the end of a street show with a guy somersaulting over 4 bent over people, and through various bands and street performers until we got to the Summer Stage, where Yemen Blues were playing – totally free to get in. We sat on the mat watching the most varied talent of dancing I have possibly ever seen. It was a pretty cool sound, which I cannot possibly describe without sounding like an absolute douche – just look them up. In the evening it was great to catch up with Tyler for the first time in 2 weeks or so.

After work on Monday I skyped the rentals, which was really really nice, and got to see broo too, plus the cats – classic mum bringing them up to show me (was nice to see them though). I told Dad I was going to see Cool Hand Luke in Bryant Park and he said “he eats a lot of eggs”, nothing much more than that – I was thinking he’s lost it. After watching it with Deepa (who I got a beer with at Jimmy’s corner beforehand), Adam plus Tyler and two of his workmates, I realise he wasn’t barmy but I would say that’s a very memorable part of the movie – plus it was like a grittier better version of Shawshank Redemption, without the Disney ending.

On Tuesday Adam and I went out to Off the Wagon, a bar downtown that has Beer Pong tables in them, after 6 weeks of Beer Pong celibacy we were desperate. Onto our second pitcher waiting for Adam’s English friends to come to the bar, we signed up for Beer Pong on the chalk board and were soon facing two hammered guys who were on an 8 match winning streak, it was one of their birthdays and they had been celebrating hard. Despite being blind drunk they couldn’t miss a cup, we did pretty well ourselves, by “we” it was mainly me, but I’m a team player and wouldn’t want to take the credit so obviously. We lost by 2 cups after the guys managed to get both their ping pong balls in the last cup, ridiculously good aim.

Adam’s friends, Jon, Nick, Charis and Hannah who had been on a trip via Boston and DC before coming back to NY to head to the west coast, joined us upstairs at two other beer pong tables. They managed to convince Adam that Hannah and Jon had got together in DC and that now it was really really awkward. I played along by asking Hannah about it, Adam looked shocked that I had been as rude as to ask her about it – don’t know why he looked shocked though, I love making the awkward obvious. Anyway he totally bought it and may even be reading this now realising that he’s been fooled. HA! Some English guys came and joined us and tried their best at wooing the girls, who paid them enough attention to get a free drink without actually getting with them. The girls didnt want to drink the beer but did want to play so myself and Adam ended up drinking their share too. It took a while to get home since I couldn’t find the station I had arrived at, apart from that all was good.

It’s a painting not a photo…mental

Nick taking his 3rd photo in a row

Rooftop of the Met with Adam and Mealy

Pole dancing, Ick-ea and a mad decent block party

Friday saw the return of Puffy’s work bant with the largest turnout so far. We stayed for quite a while due to the heavy rain outside that stopped after like half an hour. Deepa, Alex, his girlfriend – Lisa (who is a really great girl) and myself headed to alex’s to drop off our stuff before making our way to this chinese restaurant, nice green bo. The other interns had already eaten since we had taken a while getting there – we got a recommendation of what to eat and finished off their beer as they left the restaurant. I had sesame seed chicken and some rice – bloody delicious.

After here we headed to Continental bar, where they were offering 5 shots for $10, such a good deal, so we got some whiskey and vodka to start the night off – Deepa’s reaction to them was priceless, full on body shaking. After realising there was Sambuca on the menu I couldn’t resist, it’s not big in America, which beats me cos its so much better than tequila, well at least i think so, as many of you well know. Deepa bailed early and Alex & Lisa headed home, so it was left up to myself and Adam to represent once again.

Adam has joined himself up to nonsense NYC and from this we had found this random night just by the Williamsburg bridge, at this club called The Delancey. It was advertised as an art collaborative event joining many things, including electronica, rock, pole dancing, tattoos, hennas, etc. When we get inside we find a rammed bar and no sign of said party, we eventually work out the party is downstairs, so we sneak past the person charging and head downstairs.

After getting a drink, suddenly this crazily athletic girl starts pole dancing, no nudity, apart from the fact that she was wearing a bikini. She was fucking great at pole dancing, and there was this random fat woman rushing about her taking pictures – weird. It wasnt as mental as the advertising suggested though and it was fairly empty so we went back upstairs and managed to walk past another set of bouncers to this private rooftop party of the same club. Totally different scene to the one in the basement, it was like a rooftop garden with a bar and seating around the little ponds scattered in big metal containers around the decking. Everyone appeared deep in conversation and being painfully British about approaching people and not wanting to interrupt conversation for fear of offending we entertained ourselves. When we did pluck up the courage to speak to a group of girls, the one we spoke to was incredibly boring and fairly ugly, two things that don’t normally go together.

After a brief dance in the middle section of the club, watching the most persistent guys in history get knocked back over and over again we headed back. It took me an age to get back home, partly cos I was across town from the train I needed and partly cos I missed my stop and had to walk 15 blocks to get back home.

I woke up and went and got me laptop from alex’s after sitting in the little park opposite his place on William St and getting freaked out by the birds everywhere. While waiting this awesome duded came past listening to his walkman and doing this random dance every couple of seconds, stopping on the pavement to dance about while shouting the same line every now again from the song. I met Adam at Pier 11 and we got onto the Ikea ferry after having been told it had been last call this other guy let us on, lucky streak continues. The ferry was really a nice ride across the east river to Red Hook in Brooklyn, which Craigo had recommended.

On arrival outside the huge Ikea store we headed to an event that was happening on the grass by the river. As we got closer we realised everyone was wearing pirate costumes, there were at least 30 of them walking about in costumes as good as Pirates of the Caribbean ones – ridiculous. They were firing guns off and had a pirate ship moored close by. We asked a guy who was a naval cadet or something who told us it was “Pirate-Fest” to celebrate maritime history. A truly strange event we mustered courage to ask for a photo from a guy who had just fired a gun and another who was holding a sword. We then got another photo with the ladies, who also used their camera to take a picture of them with us, which we thought was strange since they were the interesting, quirky ones worthy of memorialising but maybe thats being to harsh on our fine selves.

Red Hook is this awesome area with run down red brick buildings where shipbuilding used to occur and cobbled streets here and there. It’s really different to anywhere else I’ve been to in New York and had such a relaxed atmosphere. We walked alongside some Hispanic people playing baseball and soccer and felt pretty out of place, everyone had their picnics and were enjoying the game as family and friends. It was really nice to see this sense of community again though. There must have been about 20 food trailers serving those that had come to watch the games going on and there were hundreds sat down at picnic tables with barbecues set up and music playing. Unfortunately and regrettably I had brought my guidebook with me so we could navigate our way around, I saw unfortunately and regrettably since we are trying so hard not to appear tourists and want to be considered locals by those walking past us but given that we stuck out amongst the backdrop of the Hispanic people I thought it was pretty obvious we weren’t locals anyway.

From here we walked a bit more around the neighbourhood and stumbled upon an art exhibition in an old shipbuilding block run by Brooklyn Working Artists Coalition. The exhibit was really cool, centred around a black and white theme, there were some awesome pieces about. From here we exited by the back and walked by a small marina area where this drunk old guy with a bottle of whiskey by his deckchair shouted at us something indecipherable and seemed happy with our nods and smiling faces. We eventually met up with Deepa by Ikea, in which we then took Deepa for her first time. Not only that but we convinced Deepa that Ikea in England is pronounced Ick-ea, she totally bought it and said “I’m gonna start using that”, brilliant. Was great to have a lie down on the beds and watch Deepa, an Ick-ea newby be amazed by everything. 50c hot dogs at the end were a bonus really.

From here we took the advice of Rough Guide and went on got Steve’s Key Lime pie on the waterfront, it was delicious and we sat in a little park overlooking the river, really great spot. We went back to Manhattan via sitting on the top of Ick-ea ferry, we walked up coast to Pier 17 where a “Mad Decent Block Party” was going on, it was packed with hundreds of people with the stage set up just on the river side. After eventually buying some 40s from a local store we joined the party, slowly making our way to the front while drinking our Buds from a plastic bag. Claude von Stroke was awesome and Ty plus friends Dan and James joined us for the last half an hour or so. It was a great setting and a really awesome show, but it finished at 9pm hence it was a bit like, oh my night’s finished before ive even had dinner.

Fuelled up by a Burrito from Chipotle we went up to Turtle Bay NYC where Ty + half of Middlebury college were hanging out. We got a few drinks and got Ty plus friends to convince Deepa it was just a California thing to say Ikea instead of Ick-ea. Before people started disbanding around 1am, Ty on his way out knocked a girl’s full drink off the table – he left without getting her a new one since it was her fault. She shouted at me after he left saying that I shouldn’t be friends with him, I told her I didn’t know him and had just met him tonight – she bought it, ha!

Eventually it was just the gruesome twosome of myself and Adam, we made our way upstairs and found a dancefloor area, whereas downstairs had been more of a bar. The DJ shouted out that if the bar was filled with girls dancing on top of it then everyone would get free shots, they did…no free shots. He altered this to say that two girls on the bar had to make out for 10 seconds and THEN everyone would get free shots, they did…he announced free shots, the bar workers were like “no”, apparently cos the girls didnt get down from the bar quick enough – the fuckers!

Pirate Fest – that gun had just been fired

Pimpin it with the babes on Red Hook

Cool graffiti

Wire mesh – cool right!

Beautiful place…

She loved it

Giving her the full Ick-ea experience

Trapped

Great key lime pie

Loving life

They’d just woken me up

Couple of 40s at the Mad Decent Block Party

Mad Decent Block Party

Claude von Stroke

The Aftermath

Punderdome – as random as it sounds, a Trivia Night and the Irish contigent

Monday was a bit of a nothing day, apart from the groups getting switched around at work which stirred a whole range of emotions from people throughout the office, funny to see, I was pretty pleased to get the chance to work with some new people. The day ended with me making a spanish omelette with diced-potato chips – get me i know! Apart from that nothing really to report.

On Tuesday myself, Deepa and Adam took the advice of the mailing list nonsense nyc and went to punderdome 3000 at Southpaw in Brooklyn, a pun-making competition, which had been won the week before by Atilla the Pun. Beforehand Deepa and I had some Mexican food at a restaurant with a Margarita, which was pretty great – the Burrito wasnt as good as Dos Toros however.

The pun competition was one of the funniest/most random and ridiculous events I have ever been to. It was run by a father and daughter, the former got pretty drunk and started using his Bud Light can as the microphone, lad. The competitors were given a theme and they had 90 seconds to think up a pun relating to that theme, meanwhile people were chosen from the crowd to come up and sing the Jeopardy theme tune. If I was asked I was considering singing the Eastenders theme tune or just going back to my staple Nickleback that everyone knows and loves.

Each contestant had to choose a name for themselves, some of the best were “Cool Punnings” (who were the eventual winners), “Pun-tuation: and this is where it ends”, “the Pundertaker”, etc. A girl from the crowd was chosen to be the clapometer – and she was blindfolded for the vote (pretty serious stuff this pun competition malarky), she gave herself the name “steak punini” and was pretty mental herself. We sat on the floor at the front after having only just managed to get ourselves in, and sat eating our ice lollies that we were given on the way in.

The puns were all great considering the lack of time they had, this old guy reeled off a series of stinkers only for a sympathetic laugh made him feel better – bless. Deepa had to get up and sing at one point with two other girls but one insisted on singing happy birthday, it didnt matter anyway since Deepa just mimed and tried not to look awkward but in so doing looked awkward. Afterwards we met Craig at a bar on Pacific st for a drink there, I had a Bengali Tiger (made me think of Brishty) which was brewed down the road at Red Hook. Craig seemed to know everyone in there from the barmaid to the locals to the guy collecting the glasses, he was the friendly local. After a drink there and briefly meeting his housemates Charlie and Tyler as well as Charlie’s workmate and girlfriend we headed home.

We headed back to our favourite haunt, Crocodile lounge, the next evening for a Trivia Night, Deepa, Diana and Winston joined for various amounts of time and Sophie Davies from uni came along for a lil bit to check out the free pizza. We were horrendous at the trivia itself without Diana’s input or that of any American, which isnt surprising since most of the rounds were America focussed such as – Nickelodeon in the 90s and Athletes in films. After doing terribly in the quiz we headed home.

On Thursday Adam and I met with his family friend Martha plus her friends from Trinity College Dublin and we headed to Warren 77 close to where my office is, which had a huge red arrow pointing at it saying “BAR”. Inside was black painted wood pannelled walls with this one wall with triangular sponge protrusions all over it – pretty neat. We got some Bud Lights and chatted, was great to hear the Irish accent again and they told us that there were about 150 people in NY for the summer from Trinity – ridiculous. Various other people joined us for a drink at different points and Hannah got some chicken goujon thingies which were great. It was a great evening and they were really fun and weirdly seemed to think we were pretty funny – great success.