Independence Day, Uncelebrated

This Saturday is Independence Day, when USA celebrates that it is no longer part of England. I am told that the same celebrations also take place in England.

Independence Day is traditionally celebrated by getting together with some friends or family, eating barbeque until you drop, and watching fireworks. However, since I do not have any real friends or close family over here, since I don’t have a grill, since I am getting too old to be impressed by fireworks, and since I don’t really feel any obligation to celebrate the independence of a country that is not my own (or the loss of said country from another country that is also not my own), I have decided to go to Montreál instead. And what’s in Montreál? Only the biggest jazz festival in the world.

I have rented a car (it’s about a 7 hour drive), I have booked a hotel room (the Hilton, as a matter of fact, about 500m from the festival area), and I have managed to convince IBM that I should have Thursday off, so that I have all day to travel.

Anyway, since I haven’t left yet, I can’t really write anything much about the festival, so I should probably catch up on all the stuff I haven’t written about yet.




My last post ended with me and the guys having walked through Central Park to the Metropolitan Museum. A very impressive building, but I didn't really feel like going inside.
Instead, I took the subway to Lower Manhattan. This is how a subway station looks like. Unfortunately, my phone wasn't able to capture the very heavy smell of pee...

I got off at the subway station Brooklyn Bridge, which is not near enough to the actual bridge that I felt like going to see it. Instead, i just started to wander around the area. At this time, it was raining a bit, but my lousy camera makes it look alot worse:




Some sort of monument near Foley Sq. I haven't been able to find out what it is:

Some wet chessboards. I think this small park is called City Hall Park:

I think this impressive building is a US federal courthouse, but neither of our guide books mention it as a sight.

Walking north, I ended up in Chinatown. What surprised me the most about Chinatown was that English is in fact hardly ever spoken there. As you can see from the pictures, some shops don’t even have an English name. It’s a spectacular place, though. Lots of tiny shops selling almost anything you can think of, vegetable and fish stalls in the street, and lots and lots and lots of people hustling and bustling. Only one thing bothered me: It was hard to blend in.




At the south end of Chinatown. This arch commemorates the asian Americans who fell during World War II.	A look up Bowery, which seems to be the main street running through Chinatown.	A Citibank branch, with its name spelled in Mandarin as well, for the benefit of the locals.
Mott St., one of the small side streets.	Cramped shops.	Even more extreme than Citibank, this shop doesn't have an English name.
A restaurant's menu, again with no English. And yes, I have actually verified that this is a menu - my office mate is Chinese.	Dried foodstuffs from a street shop. I have no idea what is in the boxes. On of them looked like dried prawns, but my office mate suggested that it might have been dried prawn shells. Weird stuff.	Food!!! Fried fowls.
A street vegetable stall. Stalls like this are all over the place.	A fresh fish shop. Again, places like this were everywhere. Must be a great place to shop for food.

I didn’t get a picture of all the foot-and-back-rub shops in the area. There are loads of them, but I didn’t really feel that they were significant, until two ladies standing in front of one started talking in very luring voices to come in for a rubdown. I resisted the temptation, though.

Next stop was Little Italy. According to my guidebook, Little Italy used to be proper Italian, but it is slowly but surely being squeezed out of existence by an expanding Chinatown. Apart from that, i was getting really tired and thirsty, so I decided to take a look at Little Italy over a glass of wine at one of the very nice looking restaurants in the area. In other words, I didn’t get to see much, and so there aren’t that many pictures:




A welcome gate to Little Italy.

Same welcome gate, but from my position at the restaurant.

A very small protest in favour of stopping the 9/11 coverup. Keep up the fight, guys - who knows what kind of idiotic cause you would start fighting for if you gave up this one.

Next up was a walk through Soho. Not alot to see here, unless you’re in the mood for shopping for expensive brands.




The Evolution Shop. Looks spooky...	...and the window doesn't make it any less spookier.	Decorative shellfish.
And some very nice butterflies.	Some sort of fancy, way too expensive shop.	More fanciness.
A fancy furniture shop.	Broadway, seen from the intersection with Broome St.	Broadway, seen from the same place, but in the other direction (yeah, running out of inspiration here ).

Next up was a walk to Union Square, which took me through Greenwich Village. But I’m getting tired, and I really need to get enough sleep before my long drive tomorrow, so the Village will have to wait. And yes, I know that I’m falling behind by only describing a third of a weekend every week, but I find that experiencing stuff is somewhat more interesting than writing about it.

/J

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