Guggenheim and Metropolitan Museums

5th Jan 2014 Sun

We still had 4 museums to visit on our NY Citypass.  First on the list was the Guggenheim Museum, not to be confused with the one in Bilbao.  This one designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, and the Bilbao one by Frank Gehry.  Both named after Solomon R Guggenheim, art collector.  Like the one in Bilbao, the building was more impressive than the exhibits, though I did enjoy the impressionist sections featuring Cezanne, Monet, and Picasso amongst others.  

The interior is a spiral walkway and branching annexes along the way, the featuring artist is on display along the spiral wall.  This time it was a guy called Christopher Wool.  

I would say his art looks like graffiti on canvas.

WT wanted me to take a shot of this piece of his work, because we have done 2 out of 3.  The kids can read, mom!

I got slightly bored and while waiting for the others to catch-up, I decided to look for more interesting art work, and these kinky boots (which is also a Broadway show) seems to fit.

Everyone gave the exhibition their full attention and we made it to the top.

Next it was a walk down 5th Ave, along Museum Row to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  This part of the 5th has a whole bunch of museums.  It was lunch time, and Catherine lead the way to the cafeteria in the basement of the Met.  We covered (meaning ignored) a lot of art in very short time on the way to the cafe.

Catherine mistakenly thought that the child's meal of chicken tender and fries she saw in front of the queue was an adult size meal.  So she ordered 2 meals, for Melissa and herself.  Turns out these were twice the size of the child's meal she saw and looked like enough food to feed a small African village.  American chicken tenders are like a side of chicken in size, and chef miscounted, giving Melissa 7 instead of 5 pieces and Catherine only got 6 pieces.

Tessa and I, after finishing our normal-sized plate of pasta, had to help.  But there were still left-overs even after we valiantly tried using a non-surgical stomach extension procedure to accommodate 4 meals in one sitting.

The chef made the above model of the museum frontage from sugar (in between cooking large meals).

The Met is the largest museum I have ever been to.  They have everything, Greek, Roman, Egyptian, American, European, Asia and Pasifika.  Almost sounds like a food court. It has 2 restaurants and a bar (not including the cafe) that I saw.  

The building itself is within Central Park along 5th Ave.  So you could see the park from the back part of the building.  Sunday closing was 5.30 pm, so we were ushered out at 5.15pm.  There was no chance of seeing all the exhibits, but we made a good effort.  And WT didn't have time to browse and buy anything from the museum shop even though 50% discount signs beckoned.

We took a walk into Central Park after this.  It was icy and slippery.

Snow ploughs made mini snow hills on the side of the roads.

6th Jan 2014 Mon

The only planned activity today was for Tessa, Melissa and Catherine to go to  Woodbury Commons Premium Outlet shopping about 80 km north of Manhattan.  It was raining and snowed a little.  They took a shuttle bus tour which, after all the pick-ups, took 2 hours to get there.  They shopped till 5 and returned to Chinatown where I met them and took the subway home.

Proof of purchases for the day.

WT and I didn't have any plans, nor did we want to spend all day at the Premium Outlet.  So we wandered around Lower Manhattan and bought a couple extra suitcases to accommodate all current and future purchases.

Snow and Slush

3rd Jan 2014 Fri

Six inches of snow fell overnight, and we woke up to the sound of snow ploughs clearing the foot paths.  No one was keen to go out because it was bitterly cold.  The temperature was -6C.  

Since I broke my iPhone, it has been a hassle taking photos with my proper camera and transferring it to my iPad to blog.  So I decided to brave the snow and cold to find a solution around this issue.  There is large electronic store in mid town 34th St and Ninth - B&H.  

A subway ride to Penn Station and a couple of blocks west and there was B&H.  It sells mainly cameras, both still and video, and a little audio equipment as well.  There are two levels and it looked like they stock every camera type.  

The sales people sit behind a whole row of counters and they are supposed to be experts and can answer any questions you may have.  So I went up to one and asked him how I could transfer my photos from camera to iPad without using a PC.

He said the Eye-Fi memory card might work and looked-up my camera model on his PC for compatibility.    This memory card is able to wifi photos from camera to iPad.  It was compatible, and so it was $49 including tax for a 8GB wifi memory card.  The item was sent downstairs with a conveyor system where you pay and pick-up your purchase.

I came home to find that WT and Catherine had purchased tickets to go to the Jersey Boys show in Broadway tonight.  It was from the half price tix for tonight at $85 each.

Jersey Boys is a musical about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, a blue collar quartet from Jersey.  Even Tessa and Melissa enjoyed the "old" songs such as Sherry, Big Girls Don't Cry, Walk like a Man, Can't take my eyes off you and Oh what a night.  

The snow was thick, slushy and temperature cold - about minus 12 C - as we subwayed, slipped and slide all the way to the August Wilson theatre.  It was a fantastic show and well worth the trek.

4th Jan 2014 Sat

I bought tickets to a comedy show called How 2 B a New Yorker at Planet Hollywood.  Tickets were $40.  It included a buffet pasta lunch in a small theatre within the Planet Hollywood restaurant.  Catherine also bought tickets to the Lion King for herself and Melissa for Tuesday night.  This show was more expensive at $135 discounted, the rest of us weren't so keen to go.

Tessa and Melissa had an early trip to Times Square to meet with Melissa's classmate who is on an exchange.  They wandered  around Times Square and went to the zoo in Central Park.  Only the penguins were out and about.  Even the polar bears stayed in-doors.  They said.

Gaik Sim joined us for the show so the four of us fitted around this tiny table with our lunch.  We had 30 mins to eat lunch before the show started.

I said to Catherine you don't get lunch with Lion King.  One of the opening lines of the show was "You don't get lunch at Lion King".

The two actors had us in stiches and welcomed audience interactions.  When they found out we were the only visitors, there was a bit of improvisation using NZ.  Unlike other shows, they encouraged us (tongue in cheek I think) to leave our phones on to take important calls and messages.  But no sexting, they said, which is the act of sending pictures of your private parts by text - invented by NY Congressman Anthony Weiner.  I guess the picture itself could be called sexfie, you know like selfie except at a more micro level.

Mid way through WT got pulled up on stage to learn how to be a New Yorker.  So they dressed her up a bit to look like one.  Asked her to guess a kenish and pronounce E Houston St.  And how to say Geddoudahere.  Houston is pronounced "House" ston not the normal "Hews" ston.  So in Appllo 13 it would have been "We have a problem House ston"

Tessa and Melissa met up with us after the show at Planet.  Melissa's boots were getting soggy walking in the snow slush.  So she went off gum boot shopping with Gaik Sim and Catherine.

WT, Tessa and I walked down to the Rockerfeller  Plaza, checked out the Nintendo shop, looked at the skating rink and big Xmas tree.  And then took the subway home.

Catherine, for dinner, had cooked up assam laksa noodle.  Simon, WT's brother brought roast chicken and lobster to finish off another wonderful day in NY.

Islands and Uptown Manhattan

1st Jan 2014 Weds

We bought the NY City pass which gave us access to 6 iconic NY sites, Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island, Empire State Building, Met Museum, MoMA, Guggenheim and Natural History.  All for $106 adults and Tessa at 17 got away with the youth pass which cost $79.  Not that anyone checked, because WT went through the Statue of Liberty with Tessa's tickets by mistake.

The ferry took us to Liberty Island where the Lady Liberty stands.  The security and ticket collection is done before you board the ferry at Battery Park, Lower Manhattan.  It was a short trip to the Island where we walked around with the audio guide telling us the history of the statue, and who promoted and built it and so on.

The statue is made from thin copper braced internally by a lattice of metal and wooden frame.  The framing was designed by none other than Gustav Eiffel.  The copper has oxidised to the current green over many decades.  You will see some buildings with similar colour as the statue, they too have oxidised copper cladding.

For extra payment, you can visit the pedestal and go inside the statue.  We didn't bother.

We then boarded the ferry for Ellis Island.  This was the main entry point for most east coast immigrants before flying got popular.  The processing centre has been restored into a timeline museum of sorts.

The combination of the audio guide and posters gave a narration of the waves and waves of immigrants that came to the US and some individual stories.  These two islands are US national parks, and some of the park rangers are descendants of people who were processed here.  There is a similar set-up on the west coast in San Francisco,  but not as well known.

Tree of words introduced by immigrants, giving the English (American version) language another boost of new words from other languages.  These days, new words are coined by texting.  For example, Noho has joined Soho as a precinct name in NY.  Noho means North of Houston St (and Soho - South).  Nolita another precinct is North of Little Italy.

The usual end of day scene.

2nd Jan 2014 Thurs

We took the subway to mid-town Manhattan to visit the Empire State Building.  The subway was not very busy despite being peak hour 9.30 am when we boarded.  I guess most people have taken the rest of the week off.

There was a queue to get up to the observation deck but it was moving and we were up there by 10.15 am.  It helped that we climbed the stairs from 80th to 86th floors.  You have to change elevators on the 80th for the last 6 floors.  We didn't want to wait 15 mins  for the second set of elevators and took the stairs.  Catherine was a bit breathless, and I told her it could be due to the thinner air at this height.  The same thing happened to me at Mt Blanc.

It was a bit cloudy but we still had a good 360 view of the city.  The EBS appears to be the tallest building in mid town Manhattan.

It was colder up here because of the wind.  So we only stayed long enough to enjoy the spectacular view and hot footed downstairs.  Catherine purchased her souvenir CGI photograph with the ESB.  She had her eyes open this time.

We then walked 7 blocks to 42nd street to visit Grand Central station and checked out the main concourse.  And then lunch in the food hall below.

After lunch we walked 6 blocks west to Times Square.  This place out-neons Vegas.  It has so much foot traffic that the US Army has a recruiting station right in the middle.

We then strolled along Broadway northwards and ended up at Times Warner shopping mall at the south end of Central Park.  I thought we'd done well today and suggested to the girls we took the subway home from here.  The suggestion met with overwhelming approval.

New York

30th Dec 2013 Monday

We fly out to New York this morning.  With 5 people, we needed 2 taxis, but being 4 kms away from the airport, it was no big deal at $12 (including tip) each.  Delta allows you to change seats with their mobile app, so I seated us together with my iPhone.

After checking in our bags, we went through security.  Catherine was swabbed and tested for explosive residue.  They only detected Clarins hand cream.  The full body scanner must have received a privacy software upgrade.  I could not see my body scan on the monitor, it blinks OK if they don't detect anything.  So I could not check on how my haemorrhoids were doing.

The flight to NY departs from gate D, which required a train ride.   Breakfast at the diner and then a short wait for our flight.  Catherine hadn't tried the slot machines yet, so she blew $4 before boarding.

The 5 hour flight to NY allowed us to catch 2 movies.  There is no meal service, so it pays to eat before or bring a packed lunch.  You can buy beer or wine for $6/7 which I did.  They don't accept cash, (which is illegal, as cash is legal tender) only credit cards as payment.

We landed in JFK which is a really large and modern terminal.  I counted a least 3 watering holes on the way to baggage claim.

Simon, Wang Theng's brother, picked us up in 2 cars and delivered us to our apartment in Lower Manhattan.  The apartment was organised by Gaik Sim, Wang Theng's class mate from Ipoh.  It is in a fab location, very spacious and has great facilities.  It didn't have an elevator and was 4 levels up.  So between the 3 guys, we lifted a 100 kgs of bags up 4 levels.  Hernias and haemorrhoids all got a good work-out and I am sure some internal organs were rearranged too.

Simon brought a most delicious dinner of soup and sticky rice dumplings, and we were hungry and grateful.

31st Dec 2013 Tuesday

Gaik Sim took us around Chinatown and Little Italy after breakfast.  Everything available in Asia is availiable here and cheap too, compared to NZ.  It was -3C, so all the puddles on the streets were frozen, forming baby-sized black ice.

Gaik Sim then took us to her favourite Cantonese cafe XO and we had a great lunch.  Catherine was planning to cook a New Year's Eve dinner, and they were off food shopping.  

Melissa and Tessa wanted to visit the Soho shopping precinct, so I took them there.  It was very crowded, so we wandered around a bit and made our way home.

On the way, we spotted a shop selling mini chocolate cup cakes called Baked by Melissa.  I thought it'd be a good idea to get a shot of Melissa with the shop, which I did.  

Melissa was so disarming in the picture that I lost my grip with gloves on and dropped the phone.  The screen was completely smashed, and Catherine had to perform first aid on it with gladwrap to stop it from falling apart and cutting my finger when I swiped. 

It was a hive of activity when we arrived home.  Catherine was working her magic with WT as kitchen hand and Gaik Sim supervising.  I served some wine to the ladies and got out of harm's way.

It was again a fab dinner, and the NYorkers were saying they have not eaten a feast like this for a while (some even admitted this is the first meal in months not served out of a take-out container).

I was glad Melissa gave up on her plans to go down to Times Square for the ball drop.  There was a million people there, and the queuing started at 3 pm that afternoon.  I don't really understand how 1 million people can hang around for that long.  

The average bladder holds about 600ml.  That's 600,000 litres of fluid, enough to create a small tsunami and wipe out Lyall Bay (I am guessing the latter part).

We waited for the count-down, ball drop, confetti and fire works.    Appears NY is amongst the last cities in the world to celebrate New Year.  We saw Sydney, HK and London before the count-down.  Anyway, a Happy New Year to all of you, my dear friends, and looking forward to a great fun year ahead.

Ditto Day

28th Dec 2013 Sat

Catherine was so keen on Cirque, she came out to Tix4 to queue with me for more shows.  WT and I were already out and about, so we met Catherine at the box office.  Having bought tickets the day before, we were considered VIPs.  So straight to the front without having to queue.  

This is going to be a quick purchase or so I thought.  After the agent zapped Catherine's credit card for Cirque Kar and took my cash for Penn and Teller, someone in the back office plugged in the heater, blew the fuse and turned off the computer.

So the poor agents had to ring their IT help desk to cancel our transactions, redo payments, and issue the tickets.  Meanwhile the long queue behind us were getting really pissed off with these VIP queue jumpers taking their sweet time interrogating the ticket agent on the merits of row K vs row J.  Luckily the help desk for Tix4 was not in North Korea, and the parties on both ends were native English speakers.  

Both shows were excellent and I won't spoil things by writing a review.  Penn and Teller is a magic show full of surprises and done in a very humorous way.  Penn Juliet goes to great length to explain how the magic is done, but not all the way.  At the end of the show, they do a meet and greet with the audience as we stream out of the theater.  Catherine and Melissa said the CDS Kar show had a storyline, plenty of fighting action and good music.

We had another Hooters dinner before the show which was another enjoyable casual meal.

 

I had a couple request from back home for some Hooters tops.  The requesters were M sized, so I bought XXS for them.  WT said these were 3 sizes smalller, I replied with a big grin.

29th Dec 2013 Sun

If you recall the dinner at Treasure Island buffet we did not have, well we decided that we would use the coupon for brunch this morning.  We planned a 10 am start but didn't get there till 11.  So the buffet was $19 each, with bottomless champagne included.  I don't drink bubbles, so I paid an extra $12.50 for all you can drink beer and wine. 

There were many cuisines to choose from, not to mention the very efficient waitress who kept bringing me more beer and wine.  She got a big tip from WT for her attentiveness.

Wow 100% off!

We then went over to the shopping mall next to TI, the Fashion Show mall where Top Shop was over-run by the 4 shopping bunnies in our party. Then the near-unanimous vote after that was to go to the LV South Outlet mall, which is where 4 out of 5 of us are at this very moment.

I'd planned for us to visit the Fremont Street but the girls spent too much time at the mall.  And we have to pack for our flight to New York tomorrow.  So it is farewell to Hooters.

Shopping and Showtime

26th Dec 2013 Thurs

The Las Vegas North Permium Outlet mall opens at 7 am on Boxing Day.  Tessa and Meilssa were keen to get going, so they were awake and ready for a 7 am drive to the mall.  The ladies while very keen, were not as committed, preferring to sleep in.  We got there at 7.30 am.  There was already a couple walking past us with some big bags of shopping to their car.  7.30 am and they were done and dusted.

The girls OMG'ed all morning because of the name brand stores, the variety of choices and prices.  Being a long term VIP member of this mall, I went to information to pick up a discount booklet which offers further discounts for a minimum spend at each store. 

At 9 am or so, I got a text from Wang Theng indicating that they were ready to go shopping too.  So I left the girls and drove back to the hotel with the first batch of shopping to deposit in our room, and picked up Catherine and Wang Theng.

You can only ignore the need for breakfast for so long, and by 10 am we were eating some of the worst food on offer in Vegas.  My burger was rather good because it came from a diner truck not associated with the mall.

I had to leave at 12 noon to return the rental MPV at the airport depot.  It has served us well over the last 6 days.  Tessa and Melissa by this time had been shopping a solid 4.5 hours, so they wanted to return to the hotel.  I dropped them off at the hotel with shopping batch #2.  Wang Theng was in two minds about returning with us or, to continue shopping and put in the effort to find her own way back.  She appeared to have a case of severe cognitive dissonance over this because she changed her mind 3 times over the two options.  In the end shopping prevailed, and damn the transportation logistics.

I had to fill up the gas before returning the MPV or else a refill fee would be incurred.  The gas stations here are slightly different, the green hose is for diesel and the black one for petrol.  Furthermore, there are 3 varieties of petrol: low octane, high octane and bio.  All 3 comes out of the black hose depending on which button you push.  Also pumps don't work unless you use a credit card.   Wanting to pay cash, I had to go inside and leave a deposit of over $100 to get them to activate the pump.

Returning the Alamo rental MPV was a simple affair.  They scanned to car bar code, entered mileage and checked the fuel gauge.  I was issued a receipt for the money they'd extracted from my credit card and we were done.

The airport was a 45 mins walk to the hotel, passing through Town Square shops.  So I decided to walk home.  I did stop at Fry's to see if they had any new electronic toys (none).  Dropped into Miller's Las Vegas Ale House to ensure that I was properly hydrated for this 45 mins walk in the desert.  You have to treat the desert with a lot of respect.  On the way, passed the welcome to Vegas sign, and people queueing to take photos.

When I got back to the hotel, Tessa and Melissa had gone exploring the Strip on their own.  Having some quiet time to myself, I grabbed the iPad and keyboard, went downstairs to Pete and Shorty's bar to do some blogging for the 24th and 25th Dec.  You can probably tell Batch 19 IPA had significant influence on the writing style for those two days.

By 6 pm Tessa and Melissa were back and hungry.  I don't recall if I'd mentioned this.  We are staying in the Hooters Casino Hotel.  So we went to Hooters Restaurant and ordered our dinner.  Wang Theng and Catherine were on the bus home, but we ate first anyway, and they can order some more when they get here.

Hooter's has very interesting philosophies when it comes to food and employment.  The food appears to cater to people who are vegan, nutrient and fibre intolerant.  A stark contrast to the "green" food culture which we observed in LA.  

They also appear to have a very progressive employment policy, picking youth, gender and sex appeal over everything else.  Not many employers would offer these youthful but well trained employees these opportunities.  Their employment website has criteria such as "socially acceptable female sex appeal" to ensure a high standard of performance.  Very impressive.

Tessa and Melissa at a Hooters job interview.

27th Dec 2013 Friday

It is showntime day today.  I went to Tix4 tonight to queue for our discounted tickets.  It is a bit of a pot luck what gets offered.  For today, I got Mystere Cirque du Soliel for $80 each.  I also purchased a discounted meal for us at Treasure Island (TI) buffet, where the show was.

The show was not on till 9.30 pm.  So to pass the time, the default activity was....... shopping!  I led the girls to Marshall's which is like a shop that stocks branded stuff which is heavily discounted due to being last seasons, an unpopular style, or size.

Again, many hours were spent in Marshall's fine-combing through every item.  I am begining to think with the quantities purchased, that these places, to save time, shoud just weigh the purchases instead of scanning them.

5 people is an inconvenient travelling number.  1 too many for a taxi.  So I caught the bus to Treasure Island while the girls zipped there in a taxi.  They got there first and demanded to know where I was and why I was taking so long.

I walked past the Treasure Island buffet, and saw the queue was about 90 mins long.  So I went straight to Pho, the Vietnamese restaurant in TI.  We had dinner there and were done by 8 pm.

With a little time to kill, we walked over to Wynn's to look at the pretty gardens they'd built indoors and then a quick look around the Fashion Show mall.

Mystere, like all Cirque de Soleil shows, is a combination of music, acrobatics, humour and dance.  The performance was good and we all enjoyed the show.

We had a quick look into Gilleys, a cowboy bar in TI which features line-dancing and a mechanical bull.  We watched the bull operator have a bit of fun with a couple of patrons, tossing then off after a 30 second ride.  

Then it was a 2 hour walk back to the hotel,though with a lengthy stop at Ceaser's Forum shops and a look into Bellagio's Conservatory.