Manhattan Melodies, Honeymoon Style Part III

Other Random Notes

Most Embarrassing "Stupid Tourist" Moments:

1) The "$240 tip" incident -- Thanks so much to Rabon, Tim, and Steph for giving me relentless hell on this one, because it's just damn funny. Now, that is. At the time, not so much.

On one of our first ventures out and about (on the way to Les Halles, I think), I knew I'd have to tip the doorman for getting us a cab. So as not do be a big touristy jackass and take 5 minutes of his time trying to dig cash out of my pocket, I put a few bucks in my shirt pocket so I could be quick about it. The doorman gets us a cab, and I slip him a few bills. After we get in the cab and go about a block, I start getting my cash ready to pay the cabbie, again for expediency's sake. I tap my shirt pocket reflexively, not really expecting there to be money in there, and sure enough -- there's the few bucks in there that was supposed to go to the doorman. Uh-oh. I reach into my pants pocket, where there was supposed to be the $240 with which we were paying for dinner, etc. It's empty. UH-OH. This is bad. Really bad. I just tipped our doorman $240. Naturally, we throw a total freakout in the cab: "OhmyGodexcusemesirwehavetoturnaroundNOWNOWNOW!!" We explain to the cab driver what we just did, and hence had no money to pay him either, and he gave us a wave-off and said "Go, go. Just go!" So we went. I left Kris behind on the sidewalk (with her encouragement) and go hoofin' it back to the hotel. I get there, panting and sweating like an idiot, and explain what just happened (also like an idiot) to the head doorman. I described what the guy looked like, and he talked into his wrist and said, "Ramon, please come to the front as soon as possible." He thought it was pretty funny, and said don't worry, it's no problem. Finally Ramon showed up, and I explained to him what happened, and he just laughed and said something like, "Yeah, man, I thought Christmas came early this year!" He handed me back my cash, which he still had in the bundle I handed to him. I didn't even really count it; hell, for that boneheaded of a move, I deserved to lose half of it anyway. But it looked to be all there, so I gave him a hefty tip (on purpose this time), and we got back in another cab. "Let's try this again, shall we?" Kris did a great job pretending not to be worried that she had just married a complete moron. She's sweet like that.

2) The Subway Brain-Fart -- After the trip to Les Halles, and my subsequent blisters from the Cruel Boots, we decided to take the subway back to the hotel. We get in, with the assistance of the nice subway-worker lady, who told us what trains to take to get where we were going, which included two changes, including "the shuttle". We pack like sardines into the first train (it was rush hour), and go to find "the shuttle". Kris asks an orange-vested transit worker exactly where it is, and he points to the tracks where we're standing. Kris comes back and tells me this, and I say, "But which one? There's three tracks. Are we sure it's going in the right direction?" She goes back over and asks the guy, and I see her looking embarrassed and the two of them laughing. She comes back and points to the tracks. "Um, babe, look at the tracks. They only go one way." I look, and the tracks stopped dead right in the middle of the station. Oh. I reckon if they go the other direction, they're going to crash into that wall there, huh. Oops. I'm surprised we were able to fit into the subway shuttle after that, what with our giant dunce caps and all.

3) "Look, baby, there's the mall!!" -- After we get out of the subway and back up onto the street, we're not sure exactly where we are in relation to where we want to go. So, naturally, we look for landmarks that we recognize as being close to the hotel. We knew there were a few identifiable businesses and such, a place called the "The Shoppes of Columbus Circle" (which was a ritzy building housing a bunch of high-end clothing stores and designer outlets), and some restaurants and street vendors, and a giant brick wall with razor wire at the top that we thought was creepy, and some other stuff. We start heading in the right general direction, and as we're standing at a concrete island in the middle of a jam-packed 5-way intersection, waiting for the light to change, Kris looks up, points a straight-armed tourist-point off to the right, and hollers -- loudly -- "I know where we are!! And look, baby, there's the mall!!!" Like there's a JC Penney and an Orange Julius in there. Mortified, I sort of pull her arm down and say, "Babe, babe, really, shh-sh-sh...". We're standing in the middle of rush-hour Manhattan, and my new darling bride has just done the equivalent of hooking her thumbs in her overalls, spitting tobacco juice on the sidewalk, and bellerin', "Looky-thar, baby!! The mawl!!" At least, that's what everybody around us heard. She finally realized what she had just done, and Charlene Darling and I had a nice giggle.

Best "Rude-Ass New Yorker" moment: We had already been commenting on how we hadn't seen any of the stereotypical "rude New Yorkers", with flying middle fingers and people hollering at each other and such. In fact, everybody had been really friendly and polite since we'd been there. So, we're walking back to our hotel after going to see "Inherit The Wind", walking up 7th Ave. just past Times Square. We're waiting to cross at an intersection, and a car is coming off the side street turning onto 7th. There's a car with Massachusets plates sitting there parked, with a guy inside. A car passes him and sort of has to swerve to miss him. A young drunk guy leans out of the window, and in a thick Brooklyn accent yells, "Hey, move it, asshole!! This ain't Boston, motherfucker!!!" To which the Boston guy in the parked car throws up the finger. To which the Brooklyn guy responds by returning said finger and ever-so-politely inviting the fellow to come fellatiate him.

Ahhh, that's better. Now we finally feel like we're in New York.

Stuff we learned:

1) You can't get a cab to or, more importantly, from Brooklyn. We really wanted to eat at an old school, mobbed-up, Mom-and-Pop Italian joint, and got a recommendation for a great place from a friend in Brooklyn. We were planning to go after our trip to the Met, so we hopped in a cab and gave the driver the address. He looked perplexed, and asked if we had directions. We gave him our internet directions, and he still looked perplexed, and said he didn't know how to get there. So, we got out and tried another cab, with the same results. We got back to the hotel and asked Raphael, our favorite doorman, what the deal was. He said most cab drivers don't want to go over there, because they can't get a fare back. So, we gave up and ended up going to Po (see Part II), after a recommendation from the concierge. It wasn't exactly what we were looking for as far as "Italian joints" go, but it was still great anyway.

2) Tattoos are a novelty in Manhattan. The few times I'd been to New York before, one of the things that really grabbed me was the "seen it all" vibe of the place. It's so big, so crowded, so old, that you feel like no matter what you do, nobody is going to be fazed in the slightest. You could lie down on the sidewalk in your underwear and flop around like a fish while singing "I Gotta Be Me" at the top of your lungs, and nobody would really look at you twice. Mostly because they saw a guy doing the same thing last week, except he was totally naked and singing it in Swahili. So, you can imagine our surprise when, as we were walking around Manhattan all week, Kris got head-turning stares at her tattoos from people all over the place! For those of you that don't know, Mrs. K has an arm sleeve tattoo that covers her entire upper arm, as well as one that covers half of her back. After a couple of days, we were like, "What, do people not have tattoos here??" And sure enough, once we looked, they didn't. Not to say that my lovely Mrs. K doesn't get head-turning stares anyway, but usually when it happens they're not looking at her arm. It was a nice feeling, knowing that we/she had something going on that even New Yorkers thought was an unusual sight.

3) Little gay concierges don't know what roots music or "Mom & Pop Italian joint" means. When we were snubbed in our attempt to get to Brooklyn, where we also planned to go to a cool roots club after dinner that was recommended to us, we called our concierge for a recommendation for a good "little Italian joint" and a "roots music" club in Manhattan. For restaurants, he gave us Po, which he described as "intimate", and he was right. It was tiny, but served more upscale food. He apparently didn't know what "little Italian joint" meant. We loved the place, but it wasn't what we were looking for at all. When Kris called him on the phone to ask about the "roots music club", he apparently gave her blank silence. She said, "You know, like old traditional country or rock..." Still nada. Then she starts snapping her fingers, looking for more descriptions of the music that I and hundreds of others have dedicated our lives to. "Tell him 'rockabilly'...." I whispered to her. She says that to him, and apparently all he could say was, "Oh, you have to go to Brooklyn for that." Nice. We gave up. Judging by the guy's hair and posture, we're lucky he didn't send us to some pop/techno disco to go see The Roots play.

4) Getting a cab is not that difficult. It's a big stereotype thing to complain about what a pain it can be to get a cab in New York. We never had a problem, though. If you watch the street for about 5 minutes, you see who's getting a cab and who's not. Not getting a cab: obvious tourists who stand meekly on the sidewalk with their hand up. Getting a cab: locals who find a cab without people in it already, hop out halfway into the street, into the middle of traffic, and pretty much start getting into the cab before the thing even pulls over. We chose the latter. No problems for us.

5) Our friends and family rock. If it weren't for everybody's amazing generosity, there's no way we could have had even close to the great time we had there. We were able to go places and do things that would have been absolutely impossible for us on our normal budget. We love y'all, and thank you for giving us such an incredible honeymoon! We'll never forget it.

Roger