Coffee Cup Stain

These are the things I come to New York to learn about.  I spend way too much time in libraries and online, trying to look up obscure things about the things I’m terribly interested in, and every time I get deep enough, I start to feel like I’m going crazy and need to meet people.  Even if those people happen to be ghosts, like investigating the life of Katherine Dunham has opened up a treasure chest filled with spirits.  These spirits, however, are not buried peacefully in the ground and resigned to the afterlife, but are a rather rowdy bunch of ancestral spirits that like to be engaged in great conversations.  Dancing and drinking, too, are not optional, but necessary.

Katherine Dunham was into some very interesting things.  I didn’t book Manhattan accommodation and make all the necessary arrangements, to find out she was interesting.  But being here does help me to understand the magnitude of her work, and the reason it was groundbreaking when she did it, and is still groundbreaking.  She studied with Herskovitz and Redfield, and they opened up the idea that would change her life, and also change African diasporic scholarship as we know it.  They posed that to understand anything about African and African-derived culture, you would need to know the rituals.

This lead her to a lifelong devotion to travel and work in the Caribbean, and eventual move to Haiti.  This is where she found her real spiritual home, and the principles she was integrating into her art were suddenly infused with an energy and a force that they had not had access to before.  She is one of the great pioneers in modern dance in the U.S., and her work and life helped to shed light on the multiple signs and significances behind the polyrhythms.  She passed just a few years ago, having lived almost a hundred years, but there are times when the sense of loss gets replaced by that unmistakable sensation that the dead are dancing.

Each of the five boroughs of New York offers great cultural attractions and diverse atmospheres as well as unique aspects. Frequently the tourists who stay in one of the New York City hotels of five star status visit more than one of these individual boroughs as part of their trip. Brooklyn offers a great variety of cultural and entertainment options and it is also home of the world popular Brooklyn Botanic Garden. This amazing home to over 10,000 taxa of plants is located near the Park Slope, Crown Heights and Prospect Heights neighborhoods and receives over 900,000 visiters from around the world every year.

This beautiful botanical establishment houses numerous additional specialty exhibits and museum spaces and these include three climate themed plant pavilions as well as the C.V. Starr Bonsai Museum. In addition there is a glass aquatic house as well as an art gallery and the Steinhardt Conservatory. One of the most attractive features of the garden is its diverse and substantial collection of cherry trees. The Cherry Esplanade provides an enchanting stroll through over forty-two Asian species of cherry tree. It is one of the most popular elements featured in the garden.

The Shakespeare Garden is one of the specific theme oriented gardens and was established based on a donation from Henry C. Folger, who is the founder of the acclaimed academic oriented Folger Shakespeare Library. This English cottage styled garden features more than 80 plants that were referenced by Shakespeare in one or more of his plays and or poems. The Cranford Rose Garden is was established by a generous donation from Walter V. Cranford, whose engineering firm constricted many of Brooklyn’s subway tunnels. This beautiful and aromatic garden features over 5,000 bushes, which represent almost 1,400 types of roses. Tourists from across the globe are attracted to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden for various and sometimes specific reasons though they end up enjoying the diverse exhibits displayed there.

You might be surprised to find many luxury hotels in the Alaskan frontier, but they are definitely there, so that travel to the largest and most Northern state in the union is easier than one might imagine, despite its rugged climate and landscape, but you’ll find places to stay in Fairbanks and Anchorage and, even Wasilla, the home of Sarah Palin.  Wasilla is a town of about ten thousand people, and the fourth largest town in the state (Alaska has a total population of about seven hundred thousand people, most of whom reside in Anchorage).  Before it became famous and made history as the home of the first Republican woman to run for the office of Vice President of the United States, it was also the home of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race Headquarters, where the memories of two life-saving sled dogs, Balto and Togo, are preserved. 
 
In the winter of 1925, two dogs helped pull a sled carrying serum to stop Nome, Alaska’s diphtheria epidemic.  Balto the Wonder Dog received the majority of acclaim because he was the dog who completed the journey, carrying the needed medicine to the sick.  However, it was Togo that led the team of sled dogs, along with Leonhard Seppala, a famous musher in Alaska, over the longest and roughest miles in the relay across a stretch of land known as the Norton Sound.  This Siberian Husky can still be seen today, as his taxidermied body is on display at the Iditarod Headquarters.  Togo and a team of dogs traveled hundreds of miles, and would be as famous as Balto the Wonder Dog is today in Alaska, but the then governor of Alaska gave an order at the last minute to speed up the delivery, adding extra relay teams, and thus obscuring Togo’s role in the drive to get the needed drugs to Nome, and thus diminishing his role in the history of dogs. 
 
If you wish to pay your respects to Togo now, the only way to do so is to drop by the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race Headquarters.  For those who don’t know, the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race is an annual tradition in Alaska, where sixteen dogs pull along their musher or driver, across a trail over one thousand one hundred and sixty-one miles, over eight to fifteen days.  While the race used to start out from Wasilla, it now goes from Willow, near Anchorage, to Nome.  The race started in 1973 in order to test out the finest sled dog mushers and teams around.  Currently, the fastest record was set by Martin Buser in 2002 of eight days, twenty-two hours, forty-six minutes and two seconds.  You can watch the race itself on the first Saturday in March; this year, the race will begin March 6th.

As is true for every major city and minor township, there is a fascination with ghost stories and haunted buildings. Of course many places are reputed to be much more haunted than others, which I guess can be attributed to the fact that ghosts like the same geographical elements and cultural attractions as the living. Or perhaps certain medium philosophies are correct and they tend to remain stuck to the place where they passed on, particularly when this occurred against their will or was caused by a natural catastrophe. Whatever the reason, the city of Atlanta, Georgia has its fair share, or maybe even a few more, of ghosts and many of the tourists who visit the hotels Atlanta are aware of this and are eager to take part in one of the ghost tours.

One of the popular haunted excursions for tourists, and of course locals, in Atlanta is an old house in the Atlanta suburb of Dunwoody. It is known locally as the Donaldson house and was built in 1870. Many strange sensations and sightings have occurred here including a levitating bible and sightings of a young girl who looks out of one of the windows. The New American Shakespeare Tavern offers more than Shakespearean play productions. According to some it also includes the standard cast member known as a theatre ghost. Unexplained voices and images have appeared to actors, guests and staff and a strange figure is frequently seen walking along the stage catwalk in the night.

The Netherworld Haunted House is a seasonal and theme specific entertainment venue that is open annual as a Halloween attraction. It may not belong in a discussion of alleged haunted locations in the city, save for its celebration of Atlanta’s haunted history and It was rated as the number two haunted house in the country by Haunt Magazine and was rated by AOL Digital City as the nation’s number four haunted attraction. It’s important to keep in mind that venues and reenactments of this nature contribute to the fascination and continued interest in “true” haunted locations.

Chicago, Illinois has an incredible selection of cultural attractions and major city landmarks and icons that are incorporated into the daily lives of its citizens and continually fascinate, entertain and intrigue the numerous tourists who visit the city and stay in one of the luxury hotels Chicago. It also has in incredibly interesting and often complex history, which is fundamental to the social, political and industrial development of this country. Among the interesting landmarks, some of the architecture found in the city is ranked high with tourist appeal.

The Willis Tower, formerly known as the Sears Tower, is not only one of Chicago’s most famous and impressive buildings it is also one of the most easily spotted and recognized. This is because it is the tallest building in the city. In addition to that impressive fact, it is the tallest building in the United States, which is even more incredible. In fact, at the time of its completion, which occurred in 1973, the Willis Tower was the tallest building in the world. Currently this 108-story building is the fifth tallest building in the world as well as the world’s fifth tallest freestanding structure. It was even taller than the former Twin Towers of New York’s World Trade Center.

The building has an interesting and also practical history. Its plan was established in 1969 when Sears, Roebuck and Co. decided to consolidate its numerous employees in the Chicago area to one building. Considering that at the time Sears was the largest retailer in the world and had over 350,000 employees, not all of them in Chicago mind you, this project takes on a much greater importance and state of ambition. Sears commissioned the architects Skidmore, Owings and Merrill to design a structure that would be not only one of the largest office buildings in the world but would accommodate the needs of the continually growing company. This incredible building was officially called the Sears Tower until the naming rights expired in 2003. It continued to be referred to as its original name, however in July of last year it was officially changed to the Willis Tower.

As an art admirer, I admit I’m often stuck in European impressionism with the likes of Van Gogh, Seurat and Monet, and after living in the Southwest for many years I had my fill of paintings and tiny sculptures of horsese and cowboys that used to be fairly prevalent in Arizona galleries; but, I also lived in the Northwest, too, and I can’t tell you why that — if I considered Southwest Art as a form — I rarely considered Northwest Art.  However, if you find yourself in the Seattle-Tacoma area of Washington, you’ll be able to investigate this particular form at the Tacoma Art Museum through May 23rd of 2010.

Fiction writers often draw from the land in which they live to create their stories; the same must be true of artists, drawing from the regions in which they create their art.  In “A Concise History of Northwest Art,” you’ll find examples of work from the museum’s permanent collection and ranging from the middle of the 19th Century to modern day, culled froms tates such as Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington, and even outside the states, with art from British Columbia.  You’ll find also examples of Northwest impressionism, a category new to me, but ties in with the art I truly appreciate.  Until October of 2010, you may see at the Tacoma Art Museum, exhibits of Degas, Renoir, and Pissarro.  Even Whistler and Cassatt will be on display as the museum traces the influence of impressionism into the Northwest itself.

It’s enough to make me consider traveling back to my old home state, check into a luxury hotel Washington state provides its visitors and take a tour of this museum.  Certainly, there’s some amazing hotels in the city, such as the 1908 Sorrento Hotel or The Edgewater, the only hotel in Seattle to be located on a pier in Elliott Bay.  It seems like a perfect day to go take a look at some fine art and then retire to the pier and watch the sunset over the bay and Puget Sound, watching the light play over the snow on the Olympic Mountains.

The flight attendant said ‘Welcome to New York’, and all I could think was ‘Wow’. This is the city where the girls of ‘Sex and the City’ took place. This is where Seinfeld lived and where Saturday Night Live is filmed live! It was so big and so very vibrant. What would I do? Who will I meet (Besides my friend Mark)? Maybe I’ll get to meet my very own Mr. Big or see my own version of George of Seinfeld making a mess of things.

I caught a taxi into the city and was surprised that my driver didn’t recognize the address of my New York hotel Suites. I guess he was new, but after about 45 minutes I was dropped off in front of my hotel. I checked in and called up my friend Mark, he was at work and told me to come by. He gave me great directions on how to get there. When I stepped out of the lobby, I felt like Mary Tyler Moore in a big city and wanted to toss my hat up in the air, but I had no hat. Manhattan! I’m in Manhattan!
I found Marks place of work and he came out and we couldn’t help but smile at each other for the longest time. I met Mark a few years back at a convention and we’ve stayed in touch via social network sites. At that time, I was in a relationship, but now I’m three months out of that relationship and this trip, to a place I’ve never been before is supposed to be the balm on my open wounds.

We began to walk and suddenly he stopped, at a hot dog stand. I was so excited, I got to order a hot dog from a New York City hot dog street vendor! My first New York thing to experience, besides the taxi ride. The hot dog seemed 100 times better than any hot dog I’ve every eaten, or was that just the adrenaline running through my veins. I figured that was lunch, but then Mark to me to a Chinese restaurant off of Times Square! Times Square was so much more than what I see on the news or on a TV show; it’s huge! There were tons of people, business people on cell phones or texting on their Iphones or Blackberries. There were also tons of tourist! Mark made sure that we got a window seat at the restaurant so I could people watch. Mark seemed to intuitively know the parts of New York that would thrill me. There were some very snazzy looking business men, and one actually looked like Mr. Big!

Dan had to get back to work, so I decided to explore New York on my own! What can I say, except Wow! New York City all on my own! This was a great beginning to healing my broken heart.

The best restaurants New York City offers, are some of the finest dining establishments in the world.  And certainly a night out on the town calls for one of these culinary experiences.  However, make no mistake, to find some of the most authentic, and inexpensive meals in the city, the street vendors are nothing to scoff at.  From pizza to barbecue, Mediterranean to German, it all can be found via the many corner joints and street vendors.  One place that is quite popular sits in the neighborhood of El Alto.  Here is where the El Peluche Truck is to be found.  From chicharrónes to pasteles this Dominican cuisine will delight your taste-buds without lightening your wallet.  Move along to the food stand of Hallo German Food.  Located, usually, on 5th Avenue, this is one of the many places to get a true, stacked and loaded hot dog.  The famous man behind the “wursts” is Babiel.  He has been given the Vendy Award for his service and his fare, and has locals lining up for his quick and delicious dogs.

Just along the Manhattan Bridge, vendors of kebabs line the streets.  From lamb kebabs to sweet potatoes, all of the food is cooked fresh over hot grills, on the side of the street!  For cheap!  And of course there is the pizza.  Many restaurants offer take away slices, with a spice bar loaded with oregano, garlic and cheese.  One can not walk through Times Square at any hour without seeing someone enjoying a folding slice as they make their way to their destination.  One of my favorites, and something I was not expecting to find on a street corner, is the Red Hook Lobster Cart.  The lobster is toasted on a grill, and along with it you can grab a bundle of crab claws, all on the corner of the street.  Fresh herbs, spices and vegetables are available and this is one cart that will send you over the top, and onto the sidewalks of New York City.