Rhythm and joie de vivre

It’s great that I’ve been here before and visited the main attractions. When I was here two years ago, I was naturally keen to see some of New York’s famous sights: Wall Street, Times Square, the Statue of Liberty, Central Park, MoMA, Ground Zero, and so on.

Now, even more so than back then, I can enjoy just letting the day carry me along, watching people and soaking up the atmosphere. Yesterday, I happened to stumble across an open-air rhythm and blues concert in Brooklyn. Musically, it wasn’t really my thing (too much electric guitar for my taste in blues). But I really enjoyed watching the people. Especially Linden. She danced through the whole concert with such infectious joie de vivre. Which was all the more remarkable given that, at around 11 months old, she couldn’t even stand on her own yet. Her father held her for about an hour whilst she sank to her knees and stood up again, swung her arms to the beat of the music, clapped her hands and was simply happy. When her father gave her the bottle, she paused briefly… but no sooner had she finished drinking than she was moving her hands to the beat again…

Later, I walked across the Brooklyn Bridge to Manhattan – for me, the loveliest way to get into the city… I watched some Mother Teresa nuns splashing each other at a fountain, then popped over to Ground Zero to see how far along the new building is (not very far yet) and had a look at the American e-book reader, the Nook, in a bookshop – and thought it was ugly, ugly, ugly…I don’t think that thing – even if it’s cheaper – can keep up with the iPad in the long run.

Now I’m just going to finish my coffee, have breakfast … and then off to new adventures.