From there I walked uptown through Times Square again, arriving at the Modern Museum of Art just after it opened, and behind a group of French-speaking tourists that I had a very hard time understanding - I think West Africans actually do speak slower than Europeans, or maybe I'm just rusty. MoMA was so amazing! It was a fantastic collection, everything from an entire room of Monet Waterlily paintings (!) to a solar powered sand-melter that could make 3-D sculptures. I spent a few hours going through the 5 floors (the 6th was special exhibits that were in the members-only preview period) and I think that if I had picked up the audio tour I would have easily spent more time. Not the least expensive museum to visit, but in my mind it was well worth the price.
My timing worked out perfectly, just as I was browsing the gift shop I got a text from Emily saying that she was finally out of court and would love to meet for lunch. I took the train towards her office and we met up in Union Square near the farmer's market, then walked a block to Coffee Break. Ostensibly it's a Brazilian diner/restaurant but the lunch menu felt almost entirely American - sandwiches, soups, burgers, and salads for the most part, the three items listed specifically as Brazilian entrees were a little pricy for lunch, especially next to their other options. I had a half of a Cuban sandwich and a bowl of the butternut squash with ginger soup, Emily had the barbeque chicken sandwich, and while they were both tasty, we both agreed that this was perhaps a place best reserved for a nice dinner instead of an everyday lunch.
After visiting Emily's office and walking around the Union Square farmer's market, I spent some quality time in the main Reading Room at the library, admiring the rows and rows of tables filled with people studying, typing, and reading (and watching YouTube videos, of course - a study break?) Around 5:30 I took the subway up to Harlem to meet Alicia and Emily for dinner at Africa Kine. Alicia is another RPCV (returned peace corps volunteer) who was in the same health training group as Emily and me, and she now works in the Bronx at a "health home" coordinating care for people with chronic conditions. It was fun to see them in America, especially since they've ended up in essentially the same field, but in the context of eating in a Senegalese restaurant (that had a puus-laaga in one of the bathroom stalls! see the photos).
The food wasn't exactly the same as Burkinabe food, but the similarities in service that used to occasionally drive us crazy now made us smile - you wait forever for someone to serve you, you have to ask several times to have your water refilled, there's never the kind of silverware you need, and the menu even admitted that you should just ask your server if various things were available. In Burkina we quickly learned that if you looked at the menu you would find that inevitably your first 2 or 3 choices would be unavailable, so it was just best to ask what *was* available, or to list off the things you wanted to eat that weren't on the menu and see if they had some of those (often they did). We patched together a nostalgic meal of alloco (fried plantains), grilled fish with attieke (a fermented cassava cous cous), rice with peanut sauce that came with the obligatory slick of red palm oil on top, and bissap (a hibiscus infusion served cold and mixed with a ton of sugar). We did our best but left defeated by the massive amount of food - it wasn't exactly what we remembered, but did scratch that sentimental itch. Now I just need to make a huge salad with romaine, green pepper slices, tomatoes, cucumbers, boiled egg, green olives with pits, and that terrible/wonderful Maggi and mayo dressing that we would get in Ouaga...
Since all of that wasn't enough excitement, I took my leave and headed back downtown to meet my friend Chloe for drinks at Cafetasia on 8th St. She was coming from work and looked amazing in her suit coat, playful tie that was revealed to have a very tiny "My Little Pony" pattern, and her cat-ear knit cap (and her just-purchased ruby red electric guitar strapped to her back) - as she put it, she's dressing for the job she wants to have, but that doesn't mean giving up the things that make her her ;) Chloe and I met in college, both through friends of friends and a few biology courses that we took together, and I'm happy to report to those of you who haven't seen her in a while that she still gives amazing hugs. She considered going to medical school, but recently decided to pass on the MCAT and get a job in computers, a field where she is not only incredibly skilled, but also seems to enjoy quite a lot. She's working for a company that coordinates major advertising campaigns, keeping the tech side of things up and running!
More and more I appreciate catching up with college and childhood friends - it's been such fun to see where we've all gone, and even more so when we realize that we still get along well and enjoy each other's company. I didn't have anything else to eat, but her pad thai duck smelled very tasty, my ginger mojito had quite a lot of fresh ginger shredded into it, which made for an unexpected but pleasant snack with my drink. After dinner we were walking along towards the subway when she suddenly stopped, then looked at me and asked "What's your favorite kind of cookie?" "Umm...any?" I replied, a little puzzled. She grabbed my arm and practically dashed into the very narrow shop that we'd just passed, stepping into a mouth-watering wall of warm chocolate-scented air. This was my introduction to Insomnia Cookies, a company I'd heard of but never experienced, who will deliver warm cookies and cold milk to your house (in this area, probably your dorm room) up until 3am. Such a simple idea for a take out and delivery place, but right next to NYU? Brilliant. And yes, the cookies were delicious treat on the ride back to Brooklyn.
The amazing square PB&J doughnut
Wall art in Doughnut Plant
George Cohan on Broadway
Touring through MoMA
A giant room with two huge screens showing a silent video of an elephant wandering around that same room
Sophie Tottie (2008) - she draws an ink line at the top and then traces along it line by line so that the imperfections of the top line become exaggerated and create interesting wave patterns
Joseph Kosuth "Titled (Art as Idea as Idea) The Word "Definition"" (1968), made me pause and consider
I like when they have similar works by different artists grouped together so you can compare them - this is "What Is Painting" by John Baldessari (1968)
Jackson Pollock (1950) "One: Number 31, 1950" I remember as a kid thinking it was crazy to call this art, but I get it now that at the time it was kind of a revolutionary thing to present something so intensely abstract as art, and I actually did find it really fascinating to just stare at
This reminded me that some day I want to make that cake I saw that looks like a Mondrian painting when you slice it...
There's something about these pieces that never gets old, no matter how many of them I see. Claude Monet "Agapanthus" (1914-26) <--I suspect this isn't a reflection of how long this particular painting took, rather I think it means that no one is sure where in that period of years any individual painting in the series was started or finished
Claude Monet "Water Lillies" triptych (1914-26)
This piece by Umberto Boccioni immediately caught my eye, probably because it reminds me of one that I adore by Franz Marc. This is "Dynamism of a Soccer Player" (1913)
Then I turned the corner and saw "The Starry Night" and had to consciously close my mouth after it hung open in surprise and delight - I didn't expect to find this in MoMA!
Out of several paintings by Georges-Pierre Seurat, I liked "Evening, Honfleur" (1886) the best, in part because of the painted frame that he added later
Who can resist this collection of Warhol "Campbell's Soup Cans"? (1962)
Look, it's me reflected in Dorothea Rockburne's "Guardian Angel, II" (1982) :) I never realized you could use watercolor on vellum like this, the effect up close was almost like painted silk
The video explaining the process of using the sun to melt sand into sculptures
Concentrating the heat (this was done in the Moroccan desert)
The machine adds sand layer by layer as the computer guides the beam of light, and then at the end you can remove the sculpture
The finished product, in person. Markus Kayser "Solar-Sintered Bowl" (2011)
The "Mine Kafon Wind-Powered Deminer" (2011) by Massoud Hassani in collaboration with the Design Academy Eindhoven. A GPS chip inside it records the safe path as the wind pushes it through the mine field, and if it detonates a mine the bamboo and biodegradable plastic parts can be partially salvaged and reassembled to make another Mine Kafon. Inspired by children's rolling, wind-powered toys that have to be abandoned when they roll into a known mine field.
A video map showing the US wind currents at various times of the year
Everything is better with a guinea pig. "Scale VI" (2012) by Josephine Pryde
A cool doorway walking up Fifth
Emily in her office!
It was an artwork kind of day - an ouroboros in Union Square
Gnome with a cool tree statue
You're not allowed to take photos in the Reading Room, unless you're sneaky
The ceiling of one of the hallways in the library
Golden tree roots in the subway tunnel walking from one station to another underground
Food!
Alloco
Emily and Alicia - don't we look so much cleaner in America?
I promise to not make a habit of photographing toilets to put on here, but all of us were just so excited to see a plastic toilet teapot exactly like the ones in Burkina that a picture was necessary
Pagne curtains
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