George went to work early and I tried to remember how I get to the train station for my express train into Manhattan. Finding the station was fine, getting back wouldn’t be so easy. I took the 10.05 express train to 125th in Harlem and got off and went looking for the subway. Its a pretty poor neighborhood and the African Americans outnumbered everyone else by 20 to 1. I started wondering if getting a late train back from here at 1am would be a good idea…. I decided to buy a 7 day pass, I might only stay in NYC for a few days but it would be a saving if I used it for 3 or more days. I jumped on a train heading downtown, went too far, came back and failed to read the subway map correctly, ending up on the west side and thinking I was on the east and then walking the wrong way. I was saved by a local girl when she saw me looking confusedly at my map and pointing me in the right direction. I was there at 11.25 and no renae. She had no mobile either so I had no way to contact her, nothing to do but grab a soft jalepeno pretzel and wait and see. She came about 15 minutes later having sat at her subway stop waiting 30 minutes for her train. She only had 10 minutes travelling time but when the trains dont run you go nowhere.

We went into the Museum and had a coffee before having a look. I have been before and knew most of the exhibits but its still a great place to go back to. Renae is a biologist though so wanted to see all the stuffed animals and stuff, all I wanted to look at was the dinosaurs, but I admit to be impressed with the biodiversity hall which I believe is new. The place is huge though and Renae had to pack and get ready to leave the next day. We ended up racing through it in the end and the plan to see the Museum of Modern Art was abandoned. We took a subway over to drop off some stuff at her friends house and went for some food nearby. She thought it was where they filmed the orgasm scene in ‘when harry met sally’, she was soooo wrong. We had to move when a load of firemen turned up to sort out a problem which was unusual. Renae is a bit of a hippy but loves fashion magazines and I had a look through one and then see a picture of the only person I know who lives in new york in some article about fans of bands. She didn’t return my original email though so I fired off another one, maybe she already forgot about the fun we had in India last year but probably she was busy.

Renae ran off but first we arranged to meet up later that night to watch a band she likes, ‘Sahara Hotnights’ a Swedish all girl Indie rock band. I had listened to their myspace page and they seemed ok, I would learn the truth later. Having nothing better to do I looked up the address of the club and walked down there, with a few hours to kill I could hang out and explore nearby, safe in the knowledge that I would be there on time and not late again. Renae had repeatedly called me an idiot for coming to a the couchsurfing gathering and not knowing where it was. The weather wasn’t the best in NYC, it rained while we were in the museum and it was overcast and the temperature had dropped. Good walking weather though, as long as it didn’t rain. I took it as a good chance to soak up the vibes and stroll with no hurry. NYC is a great city and I love being here, its so international and you can see stores and businesses from every continent on every block. Sure, people are in a hurry, but not everyone, it just makes the place more alive.

I found the club and learned that the tickets had sold out, renae promised to call me later to let me know if I needed a ticket and when she did she said her friend had cancelled so luckily there was one going. Doubling back I went for a coffee in the place they really filmed when harry met sally, some crazy salami joint with sawdust on the floor and pictures of celebrities everywhere. Didn’t do any harm to the business I tell you! I got a call back from the real Kramer from Seinfeld to let me know I had a seat on the reality tour the next day. He was the inspiration for the guy on the TV show and it was just about the only thing I wanted to do in NY since they had shut down the statue of liberty. He gives a chat about the show for a couple of hours and then you jump on a bus and cruise around the city looking at all the Seinfeld landmarks (even though they filmed the show in LA :p). That was the next day however and it was getting close to the 8.30pm meet time so I went over and stood around for 20 minutes until my phone rang….

‘Where are you?’
‘Im outside the club’
‘No you’re not, Im outside the club…’

Typically I was given the wrong address from the bands website and was at the box office! It wasn’t too far though so I went over for the expected ‘you’re an idiot!’ routine that never came… maybe she was starting to like me :) The band were robbed by their website though as they were really rocking the place. Easy on the eye too so I joined the half dozen or so other people with cameras and took a few shots. No idea if any are good or not though… my first gig shoot :) They raced through their set though as there were 3 more bands to come and we had missed 2 earlier ones. Will have to check them out a bit more I reckon, good catch Renae! Down in the bar afterward we saw James Iha from the Smashing Pumpkins and I couldn’t resist having a word. I thanked him for the great gig in 92 when I saw them in Manchester and said Gish was my favourite SP album. He was all alone having been excluded from his chat with one of the Swedish girls so I thought I would at least give him something to do. Besides, Renae thought I wouldn’t so I had to talk to him.

He wasn’t the most chatty guys so I said my piece and then left. Maybe this was a mistake as I had been looking up the SP wikipedia entry earlier on in the week and I then realised that not only was he not in the band anymore, despite their recent reformation and he didn’t even play guitar on Gish as Billy COrgan was such a control freak weirdo. Nothing hurts more than hearing confirmation that you’re a has been than a stupid fan saying the wrong thing :p Renae had borrowed a phone from some random norwegian girl so I spotted them and chatted for a while. The other bands were also pretty good, some guys from Brighton and a Glaswegian band called Sons and Daughters. Many jokes about the dodgy Aussie soap followed. It got late, renae had to leave for Laos the next day so we said our goodbyes and pretty soon I was leaving too. I wasn’t going up to 125th street as I valued not only my life, but the expensive camera in my bag. I went to grand central and just caught a late express back to Stamford. After a few texts that were ignored by George I was slightly worried but I gave him a ring and learnt he doesn’t do texts. I had also left a message for Mike in Boston who said he knew a few more people in NYC and should let him know if I needed a place to stay. He left me a text with the number of a girl who lived near the Museum and I arranged to go down there the next day. Stamford is such a trek out. At least I had a few locals boys chatting about weird stuff to some Indian guy on the train. That was amusing at least but im not sure they would be performing the next day.

Back in Stamford I wandered for an age looking for Georges place, ending up in dead ends and going the wrong way a few times. He said a 11 minute walk, but it took 30 minutes… Even when there I couldn’t find his entrance and had to call him. He was still up though, filling his fish tank and getting it ready for the octopus he was going to buy. Apparently they like to play with lego and can learn from watching other octopus do stuff on TV. This warrants further investigation. I gave him a great idea to run a clear tube up to his room from the living room and have another tank so the thing could move about. Hope he does it! It was now 3.30am and I had to be downtown for my reality tour the next morning at 11am. Futon time!



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